


The Adventures and Antics of PNNC

by thebluehedgehog



Category: RWBY
Genre: Fluff, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-24
Updated: 2015-07-23
Packaged: 2018-03-25 07:58:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 23,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3802723
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thebluehedgehog/pseuds/thebluehedgehog
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Make the most over-powered RWBY-verse team you can imagine. Penny, Neo, Nora, and Coco you say? Okay. Let's call them 'pink'. I wonder what that team would be like? Partial AU. Storyteller writing style. Slice-of-life, not shipping.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Morning

          I assume you have seen RWBY. Tell me, who would you put in your list of most over-powered characters? I suspect that while perhaps not the top four, Penny and Coco with their respective season finale displays, Nora with her raw strength, and Neo with her nearly unbelievable ability to not get hit will be on that list of yours. Have you ever heard the theory that there are an infinite number of universes, one for each possibility splitting at every crossroads or choice ever made? It's true. I've seen some. My favorite is the world where Penny, Neo, Nora, and Coco were all attending Beacon in the same class, and found themselves on the same team. Would you like to hear a story? I promise, it is a fun ride you will not want to miss.

          I'll begin with a morning of no particular importance, a short few weeks after the teamed formed. What better way could there be to give you a taste of this quartet's typical dynamic? Let us begin in a small room, barely large enough for four beds and four desks, yet still decorated in competing sections with warm browns battling bright pinks and oranges collectively attempting to quell the overpowering white that had greeted them the first day. A streak of green sneaks through the intentionally off-center decor in a section that has every adornment most certainly level, a section adjacent to one of the two wooden doors that might allow a hostage to escape. Only one closet was capable of being shut, but at the early hour I begin this retelling it too is open in a state of access.

          One occupant was knelt before a dresser, her head nearly hitting the open top drawer as she frantically searched the bottom drawer partially obstructed by the middle one, an unsurprisingly inefficient method. Coco froze and the various bustling, chatter from Nora conversing with herself, along with other such white noise seemed to vanish instantly. Her head whipped behind her and her eyes bore daggers into pink ones across the room, the source of a giggle only she had heard and would argue for days that she felt loud and clear despite never once denying that no sound had left Neo's lips.  
  
"Where is it?" accused Coco, her legs slowly pushing her to a stand without her glare faltering.

          In all fairness, the room had remained fairly loud, Nora still carrying on a discussion with herself about how to part her hair for the day and Penny in her own closet. Neo smiled, not just any smile mind you, a side-unbalanced smile with her head at a tilt. She waited long enough for her accuser to stand but not a moment longer before raising the shoulder closest to her tilted head a slight fraction upwards before dropping it down and raising her head. Innocence? A challenge? Coco spared not a thought as to its meaning having already conditioned herself to view her teammate as a foe regardless of the response.

"Where is my damn scarf‽" repeated Coco with embellishment. Not one to wait for a response from her adversary she stepped forward.

          Interestingly, it seemed not one pair of ears heard that demand, except perhaps the ears for which the words were intended but Neo could have easily guessed them. It was a sudden yet familiar sense of dread that suggested Penny turn around, seemingly only brought on from Coco's first resolute step.

"Wait!" called Penny with an outstretched arm, hoping dearly for a peaceful solution. She jumped forward to block Coco's advance.

Penny hit the floor with a hard thud, perhaps a bit of a cracking sound as well. She had sprung too late, Coco not so intent upon on her target to be stopped so easily.

"Nora!" pleaded Penny, looking for their final hope. It was enough, for despite Nora's deafness to anything else she did finally turn when summoned into the rising tensions by name.

Coco was close enough for her exhales to cause Neo's fringe to flutter. "I know you took it. Give. Me. My. Scarf."

          Another slight headtilt accentuating a smirk was all Neo offered in response. Not even a full second was between that reply and Coco's inevitable escalation, yet mercifully on time from Penny's perceptive, Nora emitted a battle cry that would likely awaken anyone still sleeping on this level of the dormitory building. Nora was on an arcing path down right between Coco and Neo, as though she had jumped from a high perch, with the corner of a pillow clutched with two hands wielding the small nightly headrest as a weapon of blunt destruction.

"Stop stealing my shit you fashion-blind invalid!" roared Coco as the distance between her and her opponent tripled, a result from them both jumping away from Nora's hammer replacement. This was spoken purely from anger, for Coco and Neo had a mutual, although begrudging, respect for the other's sense of style and Coco fully understood that Neo was not in the least disabled. Yet, the words had been said, they had rung through the room leaving a heavy silence. Penny was already standing, working her way between the two warring roommates; presently she stopped, out of concern as to what the next escalation might entail, and watched Neo for such an indication.

          Nora had not the slightest token of fearing the next stage; her services had been requested and that was as good as a free pass to unleash her energy towards any outlet she saw fit. The pillow was swung in a violent circle by an orange and pink blur, pink instead of her school uniform on this weekend day. The arc began to waver, the circle shifting and warping as Nora found her feet not quite making the perfect steps she commanded of them. The pillow glanced off of Neo, bounced the swirling storm from a wall, and stopped only when full-side impact of the wielded pillow met the other orange-haired team member in a burst of recycled cotton scraps.

          Nora giggled, having forgotten the catalyst to all of this and instead enjoying her willful destruction in its glory of floating pieces. Penny's shoulders slumped in defeat, accepting that no morning in this team would be complete without some carnage, although preferably that of an easily replaced inanimate object. Yes, an exaggeration, but for the team leader it would be a challenge to accept that there were easier days. Although Neo smiled at the show, Coco's anger had not abated. Once more she advanced, unperturbed by the attempts of the rest of the team to avoid disaster, for disaster unleashed upon Neo was currently her only goal.

          Neo smiled, ducking to one side, then back, as though unaware that Coco had yet to raise an arm. Neo then weaved behind her attacker, slid between two beds and knelt to the floor. Coco spun around, not to be left behind, and quickly closed the distance. A metre separated the two, a kick would have been enough for Coco to send Neo sprawling. Nora had gotten bored and returned to her own closet, but Penny had summoned the energy for one more stand.

"Coco! It is a scarf! This response is completely unwarranted and out of proportion with the crime of which you accuse Neopolitan." stated Penny doing the best she could to be commanding in the hopes of instilling reason into her teammates.

          All she got was a brief glance, enough for a black blur to pass through the room before Coco turned her attention back to her prey. This time Neo was smiling, no longer feigning fear. She moved to get up, but thought better of it when Coco threatened to lunge. Instead, she inclined her head in the direction of Coco's dresser, her eyes darting in the same direction for good measure. Why the young woman did not simply point was a matter of personal choice, she much preferred smug gestures over a banal and boorish signal; being any more forthright was outside the scope of her intentions when playing the games of her own design with her fashionista teammate.

Coco followed the directional cues, and with a parting glance at her quarry lept upon the neatly made bed covered with a green and black blanket and looked over it onto the floor where her scarf now lay.

This time the giggle was real. Neo stood behind Coco, her weight mostly stacked to one hip. "Y-you sssshould check-k mmmore c-care-care-ththoroughly bef-f-fore acc-c-cusing yur team-m-mate of theft."

          Although Neo had won this round, her desire to gloat cost her. Coco's patience long since worn to nothing had not found the slightest hint of humor in this situation and was fed up with this poor attempt to make her appear incompetent. Coco turned, her folded legs pushing the bed for additional spring, one arm out spinning with her. Neo had dropped her guard upon proclamation of her victory and fell to the floor. Coco's wrist stung, but her satisfaction was fleeting when she saw the smile still gracing the architect of her frustration’s face.

"ENOUGH!" shouted Penny, an act that continued to make her uncomfortable despite its necessity. "The scarf has been located. There is no further reason for the continuation of this dispute."

          Nora emerged from her closet, having settled on the part her hair knew to choose on its own, bushing her skirt with her hands. She looked up with surprise at her teammates. "Are you guys still at it? Geez, I would think by now you'd be more efficient at all of this. I'm going to breakfast, you might want to stop dawdling and make yourselves presentable. They do stop serving breakfast at eleven." With that she left the room, presumably to go get breakfast.

Glares, grunts, and an unhidden willingness to walk through anyone in the way were all that remained until Neo left a few minutes later, already dressed herself. Penny tried her best to stay out of it, which led to her being the last to leave.


	2. Win

"Penny and Neopolitan versus Ruby and Weiss" announced Professor Goodwitch as she read the match decided by the computer program.  
  
          This sparing class was two-on-two matches using the assigned partners. Unlike the previous matches, for this one the professor's voice hitched on the first two names. As cheers of 'pink!' morphed into a chant from Nora and Coco, the professor watched Penny and Neo make their way to the stage, her typically passive smile fell to a tight line. Her right eye twitched, her mouth threatened to become a scowl, and her free hand, not holding the scroll, tightened its grip on her crop to reassure her that some order still remained in this world.  
  
          Nora's enthusiastic chanting put her on her feet, while her partner echoed her words and smiled from her seat. The volume of the two was softened by the murmurs working their way through the other students, a mix of anticipation, fear, and desire for blood expressed more in the tone than the innocuous words they spoke. Penny took care to hold her head high, she smiled at her adversaries, nodded to her team mates left behind, and took her position beside her partner. Neo was not less poised, simply no more than any other occasion, as she twirled her parasol and judged her foes for the day.  
  
          This quiet grace was off-set by the excitement from Ruby that mirrored Nora's, beside Weiss's calculating determination. Pink battling red could be a considered a war of hue, a civilized conflict of noble purpose. Fortunately for the audience, the two teams were on friendly terms and such formality or restraint would not be tolerated, which Glynda Goodwitch would soon realize and come to regret.  
  
"Begin." said the professor with a hint of resignation.  
  
Ruby was first, her weapon unfolding as she charged ahead.  
  
"Wait!" called Weiss, intent on a planned strategy. Ruby had no intention of hesitating, something Weiss knew better than to expect, so she followed behind her leader.  
  
Penny dodged the red blur.  
  
Momentum carried Ruby to the end of the stage before she could slow herself.  
  
Weiss shifted to the side, holding her rapier for a direct attack before aiming it at the floor, forming ice spikes.  
  
Neo had dodged in the same direction as Penny, now directly in Ruby's path.  
  
Ruby struck out, using her long reach instead of speed.  
  
Neo moved to spin out of the way, but slid on the rose petals and fell to the floor.  
  
Two large knives struck out at Weiss.  
  
Neo kicked at Ruby's legs in retaliation, but the effort went unnoticed as the latter jumped toward Penny.  
  
Using two glyphs, Weiss propelled herself off the floor, then to the fallen Neo.  
  
Penny blocked the scythe with her arm to the rod  
  
Neo rolled then rose to her feet.  
  
Penny jumped back, intending to retreat to a ranged distance, in effect missing a shot-propelled slash of the scythe.  
  
Switching again, Weiss aimed fire at Penny while Ruby jabbed the sharpened butt of her weapon at Neo.  
  
Penny blocked with a spinning shield of blades.  
  
Neo shattered, appearing two metres behind with her parasol open and resting on her shoulder.  
  
Ruby laughed as she stepped forward and swung the short, spiked end of her curved blade at Neo, missing easily. "Come on! I know you two are better than this! You haven't attacked once!"  
  
Weiss took the moment to stand still, sizing up the competition. "tch, it's not like we have landed a single hit, Ruby. How about we try this my way?"  
  
"Fine" acquiesced Ruby, her weapon lowered in temporary defeat.  
  
Penny, knowing better than to let the pause go wasted, pulled two blades from behind Ruby and Weiss closer while sending a barrage of them from the front.  
  
Ruby parried the ones directly from Penny by spinning her weapon, hoping back and to the side enough to miss the blade from behind she had not noticed.  
  
Weiss captured the frontal assault with a glyph, dropping the halted blades to the floor as the one behind her sliced her arm.  
  
This did quite a bit to anger the heiress; she set a glyph behind and above Ruby, and another underneath Neo.  
  
Neo noticed she could not move as she watched Ruby jump back to the airborne glyph and be launched towards her.  
  
Penny ran forward, blocking the rocketed, revolving, red registrant.  
  
Neo closed her parasol and charged Weiss, or more correctly, aimed to charge past her and pull her back using the curved handle.  
  
Weiss parried, expecting a frontal assault, although it forced her to step back.  
  
Ruby spun to the side and landed on her feet, crouched.  
  
Penny kept five blades as a spinning shield and sent the remainder from their various places on the floor at Ruby.  
  
Neo ducked to dive behind Weiss, but was met with another blow, forcing her to parry.  
  
Ruby shot behind her, using her crouch and the extra momentum to dodge by way of bowling into Neo, who was sent sprawling.  
  
"Neo!" called Penny, who turned to retreat to her partner's position.  
  
Weiss blocked Penny before two paces were completed, rapier wielded in the hand whose shoulder was not dyed red. "I didn't forget about you." she said, anger for her injury not the least bit concealed.  
  
Penny trapped Weiss's weapon between two blades and spun it out of her hand, tossing it to the side. Her own blades began to collect behind her as she hurried to Neo.  
  
Ruby rolled out of Penny's way, and ran to Weiss, excited about how she dealt with Neopolitan.  
  
Neo was just getting to her feet, shaken but not particularly harmed.  
  
Nora had sat down and ceased her cheering at the start of the match, pulled into her chair by Coco. Unbeknownst to her, the distance from the edge of the seat to her knees increased steadily, nearly sliding off her chair by the time she stood, leaning over the first row.  
  
"You can do it guys! Neo! Get up! You aren't done yet, get up and kick their butts! I know you can win this. Team Pink for the win! Beat them and claim victory!" Nora shouted above the cheers and advice that had streamed from the audience for much of the match. Her encouragement was heard, Penny even stole a glance to her spectating teammates.  
  
Penny nodded.  
  
"Neopolitan, Nora wants us to win."  
  
Neo smiled.  
  
Penny turned from her partner to Ruby and Weiss, apparently in some debate about their strategy.  
  
Neo smirked.  
  
Penny flung two blades into position in the wall opposite their opponents.  
  
Neo walked to the center of the stage.  
  
Penny ran into position just a metre in front of and centered between her embedded blades.  
  
Ruby and Weiss nodded, then both ran at Neo curving around to either side.  
  
Both weapons hit the illusion.  
  
Neo appeared closest to Ruby, her smirk unwavering.  
  
Ruby swung.  
  
Neo jumped, landed on the blade, and backflipped off toward Weiss.  
  
Weiss attacked in a flurry of jabs.  
  
Neo dodged most of the planned combination before rotating her parasol from her shoulder, using it to push the rapier to the side with its own momentum, and kneeing Weiss.  
  
As Weiss fell the back end of Ruby's scythe swung for Neo's head, shattering a smug illusion.  
  
A hum was growing in the background, now accompanied by a green light that was getting brighter.  
  
Ruby and Weiss charged to stop Penny, each sticking to opposite sides of the stage.  
  
Neo appeared between them and Penny, the illusion wide enough to stop them both, if only briefly.  
  
"STOP!"  
  
Professor Goodwitch's eyes were wide, her voice threatening enough to silence the entire class. No, most of the class. Nora's chanting of 'pink' had resumed, but now faded slowly, and the four combatants seemed to be deaf.  
  
"Enough! Match OVER!"  
  
This too had little effect, causing nothing more than a falter in Ruby and Weiss's progress.  
  
"ENOUGH!" shouted the professor, her voice cracking at the volume and tinged with fear.  
  
Without allowing this command to be ignored, purple tendrils of light reached out from her crop for each of the four students, with an extra to tackle the blades used in Penny's ritual.  
  
Ruby and Weiss were pulled backwards, flying into the air as their momentum fought against it before landing on the floor.  
  
Neo was yanked from near center stage and flung into the railing that separated the stage from the audience.  
  
Penny's arms were bound to her torso, and was pulled towards the audience in such a manner that her legs were forced to stumble in that direction.  
  
The final purple whip struck out at the top three blades, attempting to dislodge them. They succeeded, but not soon enough. The built-up energy found an outlet upwards first, before spilling forward in its originally intended direction.  
  
          The students not on stage erupted in rowdy applause and whoops, Nora even standing on her seat and punching upwards while she screamed along with her classmates. It might not have been the most interesting match, nor even the most destructive, but despite not breaking any records or bones it was not a disappointment.  
  
          The purple arms vanished, and a hand reached up to run from under one of the professor's closed eyes to her nose. Quietly, easily drowned out by the din of the class, most certainly if her calls of the match being ended went unheard, she took a deep breath and spoke two words that by some miracle where heard by every student in the room and just as surprisingly made it louder: "Class Dismissed."

 

 

 

Not long after, Professor Goodwitch sat at the edge of the stage, leaning her back against the short wall that encircled it in the otherwise vacant room, her scroll held to an ear.  
  
"I ended class early today due to some, collateral damage." she said, her voice soft, not weak but defeated.  
  
On the other end of the call the reply still possessed some mirth. "What? Why is that a probl- oh . . . OH." It had taken a moment for the headmaster to recall the faculty's preferred moniker for team PNNC. "I am afraid to ask, but I must . . ." he began to continue.  
  
The professor answered before he put the question into words. "I think the problem was when Nora asked Penny to win." Her eyes were closed against the painful memory that kept playing in her head.  
  
All trace of mirth foregone, compassion was all that remained when the headmaster said, "I'll bring you some tea in a moment."  
  
"I think something stronger is in order if you ever want this class held again." threatened Professor Goodwitch.


	3. Cookies

          Mid-afternoon light shone orange through short windows mounted high in a room whose stone walls' texture was visible through thick but chipping white paint. This room, decorated only with its practical functions, contained a yellow-tinted refrigerator, an old gas range with an off-white stovetop spotted with red and brown stains, and other out-dated and ill-cared-for instruments of food preparation. The faded green countertop, nearly white, was dusted with upset flour from a large purple mixing bowl beside another metal one. Two wooden spoons, one licked clean, laid beside the bowls, they too mismatched and part of the kitchen's own collection.   
            
          Chocolate and sugar were just now beginning to overtake the smell of burnt cheese and bread, crumbs from previous use that would soon be forever affixed to the bottom of the oven. The light was on, and a face held close to the small oven window attached to a body wiggling in anticipation. This body groaned, not looking away from the glow and radiating warmth.   
  
"Why must it always take so long? Hasn't _someone_ found a faster method yet?" she complained but in good nature. "And before you ask, no, making it hotter doesn't help. I tried that once." said the young woman, answering an unspoken question, with a shudder as she stood up. "They came out burnt AND undercooked! Not that cookies are not better a little raw, those are the best, but I think burnt and gooey is best for marshmallows, and even those can't just be burnt, if they don't have enough time the inside is cold and not at all messy."   
  
          Nora had turned to her companion amidst her rant, lips pouted and nose crinkled. Her companion shifted feet, her arms held behind her, and her face clean in contrast to the streak of flower across Nora's forehead and the dot of chocolate beside her mouth.   
  
Nora's disgust was short lived, her excitement unable to let her smile hide for long. "I am SOOOO glad you thought of making two batches! I'm not sure how I could have survived." she said with a giggle. "I probably would have eaten all the ones we planned for and ruined everything."   
  
Penny did not return the smile, but not for lack of effort. "Nora, I am still not sure about this plan. I do not see how this is nice or good."  
  
Nora took a step toward Penny and placed a hand on her shoulder with a smile as she spoke her assurances to her accomplice. "Penny, I told you, it's a prank. No one will get hurt, not really, we get the fun of planning it, and she gets the fun of planning a revenge."  
  
Penny was not convinced, despite having come so far in the plan, voiced her concerns. "Revenge is for anger. How is that something to desire? We made untainted ones for our team because the others would not be pleasant to consume. Ruby is our friend, why would we act to have something unpleasant happen to her?" she asked.  
  
Each thought of her plan fueling her mounting anticipation, Nora replied by first correcting her team mate. "Not the team, just us, silly. But why prank her? _Because_ it's bad. It's different, against the rules, unexpected - it gives a rush of adrenaline all without anyone being hurt. Even better, then we get to be scared, just a little, at what she might plan against us. Don't you feel a little excitement? It is like a game, we take turns each attempting to out-do the other and be more creative."  
  
"Trepidation is the word I would choose." said Penny. "Rules have a purpose."  
  
Nora interrupted Penny, "But tell me, what are rules for, all rules in general?"  
  
"Well, they are to keep us safe, are they not? To allow trust between strangers, to protect everyone, to ensure a civil society of collaboration?" Penny's uncertainty in what the correct answer would be was apparent in her questioning tone.  
  
"EXACTLY!" exclaimed Nora a bit too loudly causing Penny to hop backwards. "To _protect_ people. Is anyone being hurt? Seriously hurt? No! It's just a little fun, like a board game where everyone has to learn to lose occasionally or it's no fun for everyone else."  
  
"Would this not be a game of losing with no goal, end, nor win condition?"  
  
Nora shrugged at Penny's definition of the game she was playing. "I suppose, but then that makes it a game of equal points and fair turns, doesn't it?"  
  
Penny sighed, far too deep in this undertaking to back out anyway no matter her hesitations. "I hope you are correct. I do not wish to find myself facing punishment for my participation."  
  
Nora laughed, "You won't get in trouble, although Ruby might include you in her retribution, it would be in good fun. Besides, people eat peppers like this all the time, although I don't know why, so it isn't like it's harmful, just a surprise. Surprises are fun."  
  
Penny shook her head.  
  
          Not soon after, no more than an hour, the two conspirators stood before a door. Nora held the plate of cookies wrapped in plastic, while Penny carried the bag of their supplies and the safe cookies that remained. Nora motioned for Penny to open the door, who instead took a step back and looked down the hall to their own door. With a roll of her eyes, Nora used the toe of her boot to bang against the door in an erratic rhythm highly dependent upon the momentary status of her balance.  
  
Mostly without pause, the knocking was met with grumbles before rousing Ruby who opened the door with a welcoming smile mixed with curiosity. "Hello?"  
  
"Hello!~" came Nora's enthusiastic greeting with a hint of melodic quality. "I brought you some cookies! Me and Penny were making some for us, and our team I guess, and she had the idea -"   
  
Penny bumped into Nora.  
  
Okay, well we-"  
  
Penny tapped Nora with her bag once more.  
  
" _I_ realized that cookies are just too good to not share, and we had the bowls out, and spoons, and the oven going anyway, so we made a batch for you too." finished Nora, her enthusiasm having lessened with each bump.  
  
Ruby swung the door open with a grin. "What? Awesome! You guys are the best!" She turned her head over her shoulder to her three busy team mates, "Guys! They made us cookies!"  
  
This announcement drew distracted noises of acknowledgment from the three. Ruby slid her hands under the plate with a shrug, "Don't worry, if they don't agree to thank you later I just won't share with them."  
  
Penny was moving subtly to the side, eager to leave.  
  
Nora noticed and gave Ruby a similar shrug. "I suppose I should leave you guys to your studying, I think we should get the remainder of ours back to our team while they are still warm." said Nora, in an attempt to excuse Penny's behavior.   
  
Ruby replied with a nod, "Yeah, these guys are not fun at all today, but made some not-at-all subtle threats about me leaving. They won't even play study games!" she lamented. "Anyway, before my imprisonment is extended I should probably get back."  
  
"Yeah, me too." spoke Nora. Penny gave no indication of an intention to speak herself. "Bye, see you later!"  
  
Ruby backed away from the door. "Bye, and thanks again!"  
  
The door closed, and Penny sighed. Nora spun to glare at Penny, but it did not last long as a malicious grin spread over her lips.   
  
The two waited, Penny unsure what to do next but leaning in the direction of their own dorm, while Nora stood firm to the spot. Minutes passed and Penny began to fidget, uncertain as to Nora's delay.   
  
Breaking the silence was a shout, "HAWT!" that struck through the door they stood before. A chair scraped harshly over the floor before landing with a dull thump on a rug, accompanied by shoes racing for the bathroom.  
  
Nora tilted her head, looking at Penny, and mouthed "Weiss?" with an air of confusion. It had not come to mind that anyone but Ruby would be the first to have one of the treats. In fact, she had not considered anyone else on the team even tasting one. Her eyes widened, but still her feet remained in place.  
  
"Hot? I held the bottom of the plate, they weren't _that_ bad."   
  
A pause with only the sound of running water.  
  
"Yeah, they're nearly cold."  
  
A muffled voice came from the source of the water as it was shut off.  
  
Another pause.  
  
A shout, even louder. "How dare they taint the purity of cookies!" screamed a voice, unobstructed from a swallowed bite, full of indignation.  
  
A soft laugh could be heard within and a separate creaking of bed springs. Penny took a step away, and Nora twisted but her curiosity held her planted.  
  
A different laugh, louder, came from Yang as indicated by the voice that overtook it. "Oh Ruby, you really should have known better, at least a little."  
  
A cry of frustration fueled by the laughter of now two students met the traitors waiting in the hall.  
  
Nora looked to the door, then Penny, before suppressing laughter enough for her whispered command, "Run."  
  
          And that was exactly what Penny and Nora did, without a glance behind them, without any heed to the door that probably opened or the ensuing shout, with only the one goal of retreating to the shelter of their room. Nora had her scroll out long before they reached the door. When it closed behind them they slid down it to the floor, breathing hard. Nora turned to Penny, sporting a large grin, the silent look lasting mere seconds before the instigator exploded in laughter.


	4. Hallway

          This next tale begins in a hallway. A hallway long and tall, with one side allowing enough sun to stream in through clear, glass rectangles with rounded tops to illuminate the other wall, which was spotted with doors. The carpet, a dark red pattern, muffled the sound of steps made by the trickling stream of students that was quickly expanding to fill most of its width. Class had been dismissed and students streamed out of rooms chatting amicably about their plans for the rest of the day, while others waited or tried to push their way in, and still others looking at course books whilst squatting outside a door.  
  
          Two female students, one wearing a beret despite being indoors, maneuvered through this fray with an air of experience, despite being in the youngest age group, as years of schooling prior to Beacon had prepared them for this writhing obstacle course.  
  
          The mass of students, moving as though a single organism, was struck a blow. A collective gasp from one location seemed to sweep through its swarming parts as a hole was ripped through its center. In that strikingly empty patch of hallway stood two young, female students as the eye of the storm. Attempting to become part of the crowd wall, but rejected with a shove and enlarging of the gap, was a male student, likely their same age.  
            
          As the onlooking students pushed their way back, the trickling whispers of what had transpired gave way to a quiet hum of gossip. The clear area now spanned the width of the hallway and nearly the same distance down its length in a curved square. Some pushed to get close and watch, others wanted nothing more than to get to class unharmed, none more so than the young man desperately attempting to become an invisible member of the student body once more. However, this was not a wish that would be granted today, for he had bumped into a member of the notorious team . . .  
  
"Pink," the single word that escaped his lips nigh inaudibly with an air of reverence.  
  
          Nearly entrapment, how was any student to recognize the team exalted as harbingers of destruction attired in the uniform that adorned every student? Perhaps without the exaggerated reaction from the student body his transgression might have gone unnoticed. Perhaps if it had been a lone member of the team, perhaps one of them was more sane, or at least forgiving. Alas, he was not so fortunate this day.  
  
          The silence of the two female students, and that of the bystanders only heightened by the murmurs flowing through, was broken by sudden sound. The reticence was cracked by a giggle, and shattered as the sound quickly morphed into the full-body cackle of the companion to the student he had so regrettably bumped into. Cutting through the anticipatory stillness as sharp as any blade, the eerie display of mirth halted abruptly at its peak. With the sound gone, all that remained was the occasional nervous shuffling from a member of the audience; the young man appeared so fearful the he might fall to the floor given just another minute of delay.  
  
Unfortunately for this student, this pair from PNNC had not come from class, but a weapons maintenance lab they utilized in an empty period.  
  
A chink of metal alerted the entirety of the hallway, refueling the drive for some students to push for a good vantage point, and eliciting a whimper from the ill-fated young man.  
  
          The mouth from which the laughter that would soon fill his nightmares was emitted now smiled as a side swing with an upward curve fell just shy of skimming their audience. A puff of pink formed a new, larger window from two on the wall behind the female duo. The regretful instigator was fast enough to take advantage of his narrow warning to collect aura at his abdomen, saving some organ functionality. His body was propelled upward, force in plenty to take him far beyond the controlled arc of the hammer. As his body disconnected from the weapon, any relief was short lived as the ceiling of the corridor prepared its own assault upon his back.  
  
          Chunks and powder from plaster rained down upon the collected students from not only the ceiling, but the next floor and roof above it. Nora struck a pose, leaning against her hammer, a hand over her eyes to shield them as she attempted to stare out through to the sky overhead.  
  
The dust settled, the collected audience began to recall their original purposes in the hallway filling it with a mounting return of conversation. Coco grabbed her satisfied team mate's arm and began to drag her through the throngs whilst grumbling to herself, "One week. Not one week without an incident. Maybe if we leave, Ozpin won't know. That's dumb. It is always our team. It's always team PNNC. One day someone else will do something and we'll get blamed without a second thought. They might not even bother to let us know they are blaming us having given up on punishment. Ha! If only."  
  
          Pushing through the fringe of the gathered students, Coco stole a look back to her charge. Nora had folded her hammer back up and sheathed it. With an extra tug Coco continued her march, and her vocalized thoughts, this time at a speaking volume for Nora's benefit.  
  
"Penny will not be happy about this. What's the point of being called into the headmaster's office anyway? We already know what Ozpin'll say, and he must have figured out by now that those words don't stop it." she lamented, dreading the summons, dreading Penny's disappointment and exasperation. Coco was embittered as well, she thought more highly of herself than trouble maker. Even at their best, it seemed the team would still find itself treading on thin ice on the sea of mischief. She could have - should have made more of an effort to stop her team mate. But would it have done any good? Unlikely, but without having tried it could not be argued.  
  
          Coco and Nora reached the door to their room, both looking up to it, blinking in surprise that they made it. There was not any reason to expect a member of the school's staff to intercept them, their room number and schedule readily available, but rash actions are almost certainly accompanied by rash thoughts.  
  
          Nora smiled at the door, expecting the one who led her here to open it. She always liked to pause outside of it anyway, and admire her handiwork. Not long after team selection PNNC had formed a reputation, one the members of the team were not terribly fond of. Within the first month, one, or perhaps multiple, students had carved the student body's preferred epithet for the team diagonally across the door while the team was eating dinner. 'Wreckage'. Each stroke was made up of several slashes, some too long, some lines merely deep while others striped wide.

 

          Now, though, the word was obscured. Five sheets of paper, lined up vertically down the door and taped on, had been arranged carefully, with some minor overlaps or off angles. Each sheet had a single letter, meticulously drawn and artfully decorated with designs or patterns in shades of pink and orange. They spelled out 'SMASH', the informal team name that Nora was determined to make stick to overrule 'wreckage' as their peers' favorite; it may have primarily applied to her, but it was not far off from Coco's own fighting style as well and more importantly was not merely given from without but a designation of a teammate's own design.


	5. Room 25 C

          As you are probably very much aware, adults tend to dislike when children, however close those children may be to adulthood, do things which inflict upon those adults more work. As can be assumed, repairing a sparring classroom, the aftermath of pranks stained into carpets and along walls, holes in floors, ceilings, walls, and rooftops, and various other marks of PNNC's existence requires time even with telekinesis and most importantly - paperwork. Although adults do seem fond of paperwork and bureaucracy, it is a lie, they like order and such nuances are the cost they must pay for a small amount of control in their lives.  
  
          Our dear team, despite the volatile combination not being of their own volition, found that as team PNNC such occurrences happened around them regardless of their efforts to damp their propensity for destruction. Adults like control, however, and expect it regardless of the situation; the team in question had been formed by chance where the fault lies with countless seemingly insignificant events, so that both the adults and children could claim themselves as victims. In a way, that could be supposed to be true.  
  
          It was with this understanding, and the need for the faculty to exact some retribution, that two students currently sat quietly in the otherwise vacant 36C classroom. Typically detention would be served as a group, but as an unspoken admission of the students being partially victims of chance themselves, the faculty had chosen to separate them and the punishment to be an exercise in doing nothing as opposed to some menial chore that those conferring agreed would likely spontaneously explode upon contact with this group of four.  
  
          Coco sat perched on a desk, having already found that without careful positioning an unbalanced load would result in it tipping, her legs sprawled over a second. As welcome as the peace and silence was, so unfamiliar had it become that it was creeping along her limbs unnervingly. Her time at Beacon had taught her a wariness of silence for it was so often fleeting and broken abruptly. She whipped around at a slight noise behind her, tearing her glazed sight from the windows, her feet falling from their desk and clattering as the buckles of her boots hit the bars supporting her seat.  
  
          Penny adjusted her position, fixing her posture as she gratefully read through the text she could finally study without several interruptions per page. Her attention turned to Coco at the sudden, high, sound of metal hitting metal that broke the reticence of this longed-for reprieve that was only just beginning to feel like punishment a full hour in. Their gazes met, both a small part afraid the other would channel her partner or the chaos embodied by the team as a whole and tear them both away this break neither had previously realized how much she desired.  
  
          Smiles were exchanged; Penny returned to her book; Coco slid to her feet and stretched. Neither was able to trust this silence, but the initial nervousness when this quarantine began had subsided. Coco broke their speechless exchange with an apology that she did not even try to stop Nora in the hallway. Penny responded in kind with her involvement in destroying the sparring classroom. They shared a pause, each wondering if there was anything that would at least tone down the destruction that enveloped their team.  
  
          Penny spoke up first with a reminder that their room had not needed significant repairs in a while, maybe a full week by now with only mishaps they could clean up on their own.  
  
"Don't jinx it!" said Coco with a start, her eyes wide along with the hiss of the words forced through her teeth.  
  
Coco had never been one for superstition, flaunting her disregard for them to elicit reactions when bored. But now? Now she would still claim such when asked, but more and more found herself treading carefully around cracks in sidewalk. On team PNNC, having a back break spontaneously no longer seemed to be a remote possibility.  
  
Penny clamped her hands over her mouth, her eyes darting around the room expecting one to suddenly crumble.  
  
"Although, I suppose it has been fun at times, despite frighteningly frequent." admitted Coco who earned a nod from her teammate.  
  
Penny lowered her hands and turned to face her fellow prisoner. "It is not simply that these things are done _to_ us, for I was assisting Nora when she was baking those cookies and she warned me that retaliation was, as she said, 'part of the game'."  
  
"You not being there wouldn't have changed a thing, except the kitchen might've caught fire." assured Coco.  
  
"There would not have been any safe cookies for us."  
  
Coco smiled at Penny's small jab. "True. I did not stop her either, when that student bumped into me."  
  
Penny sighed, looking back to her schoolwork. "I am the team leader. I should know when to stop us from doing something bad, and know how to stop it."  
  
Coco slid from the desk and placed a hand on Penny's shoulder. "I doubt there is any stopping it. She's my partner and I stood by when she hit a student into the sky."  
  
Penny looked up to Coco's face as she responded, "Nora seems to be a constant, but it is all of us that are at fault. We are one team and rarely do we act alone. The teachers have punished all four of us; they know that it is a group problem."  
  
Coco shook her head. "It's like a curse on our team. Even when we try it just happens. Just enjoy the ride and hope no one gets hurt."  
  
"Complacency is not without fault." said Penny.  
  
"Penny, there is only so much we can do, and controlling this team is not possible for any one person, if it was the professors would have done so already. All we can do is be the best us we can be, and try not to break anything that is irreplaceable beyond repair."  
  
          Coco slid into the seat behind Penny, her back leaning against the wall as she allowed the other to resume her studies. The light from the windows glowed a deep orange. The sound from the clicking clock indicated the return of the rare quiet they were afforded. Coco closed her eyes.  
  


* * *

  
          Penny's attention snapped up to the door, the reaction mutely mirrored with Coco opening her eyes. Again a crash and clatter was heard from what they could only assume was down the hall in room 25 C. Penny turned to Coco, unsure of what was expected of her. The calm demeanor of the other student was little consolation, and no answers came from the shrug of her shoulders.  
  
Penny stood up, intent upon walking to the door but stopped when Coco spoke.  
  
"It's not our problem."  
  
          Penny turned to Coco, not quite understanding how her teammate was nonchalant about the next tally of their team's destructive habits.  
  
Coco elaborated for her leader: "Our task, right now, is to sit in this room and behave." She looked to the clock, "We were ordered to not leave this room, and have it unmarred by our presence, for a set amount of time which extends into just over an hour from now."  
  
Penny looked to the door again, in time for a muted sound of shattering glass and a shout to arrive from beyond it. "Are we to make not attempt to quell their misbehavior?" she questioned.  
  
Coco shrugged again, her hands focused on unlocking her scroll. "Maybe, if it has not stopped in 64 minutes. Until then it isn't our problem."  
  
          The offer to ignore whatever horror was being inflicted upon that room was too temping alongside the reminder that they had two instructions from superiors that may not absolve inaction but seemed to ofter some peace of mind.  
  
          Penny sat back down and ran her fingers over the slick pages of her book, Coco lounging behind her flicking her fingers along the screen of her scroll accompanied with quiet, electronic noises.


	6. Room 36 C

          Nora drummed her fingers impatiently against the desk as she looked at the clock for what must have been the twentieth time. Six minutes. She had been sitting there for six minutes of their three-hour detention and she could no longer sit still. Propped against her chair was a backpack with nearly six hours' worth of schoolwork, but the words on the book in front of her were just blobs of colour that danced around the page. It would be fine if she were in the library or her room, but here she suddenly wanted nothing more than to scream or be anywhere else. Being told what to do never sat well, it caused her to think solely of the opposite. Being led was fine, it did not even need to be subtle, but this was torture.  
  
          A pencil flipped through the air and bounced off of Nora's head, who spun around with enough energy that the desk toppled to the side. Neo stared at her, smiling, her head held by a hand supported by her own desk. She blinked at Nora, before her now empty hand placed a finger over her lips. Neo had made some progress on her own notes.  
  
"You shush! I can't stand this. It's so dull, and why this room? and what am I supposed to do?" inquired Nora, more as an attack than a curiosity.  
  
Neopolitan pointed to her own open notes, then to Nora's bag.  
  
Nora growled her frustration. "I know that! I can't study like this. It's too quiet, too empty, too . . . nothing!"  
  
Neopolitan gestured toward the whiteboard in a sweeping motion.  
  
"What? Doodle until I get high?"  
  
          Neo shook her head and walked to the board herself. The first pen was pale, the ink low, the second worthless and tossed diagonally across the square room to the bin. The third marker was used to draw a grid, before it was whipped at her teammate. With a point to look from the board, to Nora, and back at the board, Neo felt her point was made and returned to her own stack of assignments, bending to pick up her pencil along the way.  
  
          Nora caught the pen, but was apprehensive as she approached the board. Only once Neopolitan had settled back in did Nora skip back to her upturned desk for her textbook, retrieve it from the floor, and take it to the front of the room with her. Nora was an active studyier, made most evident when she failed to accept the quiet habits of others as productivity. With this simple aid she set about simplifying the book and reorganizing it using the grid.  
  
          Twas not long before the board was filled. Neo looked up to find Nora seated in the spot in front of her, backwards, watching Neo study with an air of fascination. Nora had thought she was being sneaky, but the breath that tickled Neo's hair meant that she could only be ignored for a few minutes.  
  
          Neo's eyes slowly moved upward, unsure what to do with her pencil. She settled on swiveling the pencil tip over her middle finger and bopping Nora's forehead with her palm in a quick motion, pushing her companion backwards into the desk.  
  
Nora grumbled, rubbing her head, "Neeeeeeeeeooo, what was that for? I was just checking on what you were doing since I finished."  
  
Neo looked from Nora, to the board, and back. "Sssstud-dy-i-ing. I-it's been n-n-not th-th-thir- half an h-hh-hour."  
  
Nora glanced at the clock and pouted. "It has too!" she countered.  
  
Neo shook her head and pointed to Nora's desk.  
  
Nora continued, "I _was_ studying, but then I got bored and you made the grid and I sorted out the chapter, but then I ran out of room so I wrote smaller, then the chapter was over so now I'm here and you were just reading."  
  
"s-s-stud-d-d-yin-ng." corrected Neo. She sighed and looked about the room, willing for some idea to come that would allow her some peace. Alighting on Nora's bag, she looked from it to her own book, placing a hand on her page and flipping the cover closed before tapping it and looking to Nora.  
  
Nora took a moment to process the question, her attention shifting from Neo to the book a few times, then to her own bag. "You . . . want . . ." she began, her speech slow as she tried to put the clues together. "to read together?"  
  
Neo shook her head, but offered no further hints apart from a quick glance to Nora's bag.  
  
"To use my book? No, you have yours right here and I need it for studying too."  
  
To this Neo made a large sweep through the air with the hand that had been on the book, her other flipping it back open. She pointed at Nora's bag, down at Nora's seat, then made a circle motion mostly parallel to the floor.  
  
Nora retrieved her book of the same title and sat in front of Neopolitan, the desk and seat now turned to face her. "What now?"  
  
          Neo pointed to the sixth question on the exercises page at the end of a chapter, then at Nora. Nora hurriedly flipped through her book, with peeks at Neo's, attempting to find the question. She mumbled it out loud as she read it, before answering it easily. The answer proved satisfactory when met with a nod and a gesture to continue to Neo's turn.  
  
          Nora thought about it, not wanting to request a response that would take too long for Neo to say, her attention span wasn't long enough for that. Skimming through the questions she settled upon a solution and gave Neo a definition, taking great care to not give away the word. Neo smirked and flipped two pages back, pointing at the boldface word with barely a glance at the page. This back-and-forth lasted long enough to finish out the first hour of their confinement, but no further.  
  
Instead of asking a question of Neo, Nora groaned as she stood up, stretching and shaking her limbs. "This is boring. Too much sitting."  
  
          Neopolitan stood up and pushed past her teammate to rifle through her bag. A smile crossed her face as her fingers located a box of colored pencils and crayons; next to be retrieved was a grimm anatomy textbook packed with loose sheets of paper haphazardly closed between pages in the sections covered by the lectures. With a thump both were placed on the desk behind Nora's first, and she tapped them twice when she turned to Nora.  
  
Nora grumbled as she walked over, not curious about the next stage of punishment Neo had to offer. Her demeanor changed when she saw the small pencil case, so much so that she vaulted over the armrest to the chair, landing with her feet on the seat before sliding them under the desk. Her hand on the case, she paused. "Really?" she asked, looking to a Neo who nodded. "But I thought Coco told me to always do this one last, to save if for when we are all in the room after the library closes?"  
  
          Neo shrugged, that was not her current concern, and stepped away to swap her closed text for a second from her own bag. She had brought only three, one for each hour. Perhaps in the hour, at most, that Anatomy could occupy Nora she would be able to come up with the next idea. Twas a wonder Nora could not come up with study techniques on her own, although perhaps those were simply not quiet or solitary enough for others to appreciate. Thankfully, Ren had helped the team with some ideas early in the term.  
  


* * *

  
  
"Neeeeeeo." called Nora, breaking what had almost sounded like a normal pair studying quietly. Nora looked to the one she called, who had intentionally held back from looking up. Unaware of the possibility that she was not heard in the oppressive silence she pressed on. "I'm out of paper."  
  
          Neo reached into her bag, eyes still on her handwritten notes, and threw a different notebook at Nora without a thought as to which it was. The pages made a ruffling sound as the spiral-bound opened in its flight before clattering to the floor beside Nora.  
  
Nora bent to pick it up, struggling to bend and reach over the armrest. "Okay, this helps, but it has lines."  
  
Neo finally looked up at Nora, who sat up and looked behind her for a response that did not come.  
  
"Well, I drew all the parts of a beowolf that I didn't have already, but I am tired of drawing now." admitted Nora, reaching behind her for something on the desk. "Grimm are all black with a little red. Even using purple doesn't make them more interesting." she complained, holding up a short purple pencil, about half its new length. Her black was half that, and a small pile of pencil shavings were pushed to one corner of the desk, small ones that had escaped the encased sharpener.  
  
"O-ora--ange" suggested Neo, her patience in walking her teammate through studying wearing thin.  
  
Nora looked to her desk, her pencils and papers. "But it's still just a dumb, boring grimm."  
  
"Th-th-en d-d-draw ssssom-th-th-thing else."  
  
"Okay!" responded Nora with a bounce as she turned back to her desk.  
  
          Twas not long before a sheet of paper slid over Neo's text and notes. It was nearly entirely bright colors, with just a few errant streaks of white, on an unlined sheet of paper. The page was filled with overlapping ideas, a doodle of Neo, a smashed wall, a rainbow being walked on by what were likely grimm, lightning, a dinosaur eating from a pile of books, and different types of vines that wrapped around all the elements, including a little house in the bottom corner. Heavy black from the other side managed to peak through.  
  
          Neopolitan flipped the page over, revealing the grimm she did not see as her two brown eyes met Nora's. She knew a shadow of that grimm would be somewhere on Nora's desk, book, or notes. She slid the paper back to the desk in front of her, towards Nora, her attention going back to her studies.  
  
"Don't cha like it?" asked Nora, disappointment evident as she turned the colourful scene back up.  
  
          The only response was Neo turning her notebook over, to the next page. Nora stood, her shoulders lowered, the drawing in her hand. Nora pushed her grimm drawings back into her book, some with corners still bent, and put the text into her bag along with the drawing tools.  
  
Just as Nora was about to reach the door, Neo appeared behind her and grabbed her arm. Neo shook her head and pointed to the clock; Nora wrenched her arm free as she turned to Neo.  
  
"No! You don't get ignore me and then suddenly tell me to stay."  
  
Neo pointed at the clock again. The room showed evidence of their presence throughout, the board, Nora's marked desk, upturned desk, the text on the teacher's desk, and Nora's book on the backwards desk against Neo's small tidy area.  
  
Nora was quickly to retort: "I don't care!"  
  
Neo reached for Nora's hands once more, "W-we'll h-ha-have to b-be h-here ag-gain i-if w-we don't sssstay."  
  
Nora's hands moved from Neo's reach and she stepped closer to her shorter teammate. Her words betrayed an insecurity that her posture hid, "Then why couldn't you just study with me? You won't care anyway, you love being locked up in this room don't you? It is easy for you to be still, and quiet, and not get into trouble isn't it?!"  
  
Neo stepped back, bumping into a desk. She disappeared and reappeared with the desk between them.  
  
"It isn't my fault. All of us are in trouble, not just me. It is the whole team that is getting punished because we all did stuff." Nora said as she picked up a desk, "But the most you interacted with me is to chuck stuff at my head!" The desk hit a Neo with pink and white eyes, which shattered, leaving the desk to hit the center column of seats. "Is this the game you wanted to play!?"  
  
          Neo stood two desks away from the back wall, wanting to distance herself from her fellow captive but unwilling to put her back against the wall. Nora easily jumped to the next aisle, stepping closer to Neopolitan. In response, she picked up a chair and held it between the two of them, but Nora took another step closer. Neo threw the chair, not as hard as Nora had, but it clattered loudly against the floor when Nora dodged simply by leaning to the side.  
  
When Nora stood back up, much to Neo's surprise, she was smiling. With a giggle she picked up another chair.  
  
"N-no-nora . . ."  
  
Neo ducked as a chair flew over her and hit the wall; she rolled under a desk to the next aisle, then over another to where she had sat for much of the last two hours.  
  
"Why are you running? Aren't you going to throw something else at me?" asked Nora as she looked at the desks around her. "This is a lot more fun than studying." She picked a desk and lifted it over her head.  
  
Neo stood up straight and froze, her gaze only on the desk. "D-d-don't N-no-nora . . . " she pleaded, her voice soft.  
  
Nora launched the desk at her teammate, it shattered her and the window behind it. Neo was crouched to the side, having dove with a roll from behind her illusion.  
  
"THE FUCK N-NORA!?!" shouted Neopolitan, not yet sure she was ready to stand up. "TH- FUCKING w-WIND- DAMNIT WHY THE HELL DID y-y-YOU h-hav-AHHH!"  
  
Needless to say, Nora was taken aback by this outburst. "Neo?" she asked with caution, "What happened to your stutter?" Not the most important question of the moment, but the first she could form properly.  
  
Neo caught her breath, standing up while attempting to pull down her anger from her inability to say the words she wanted. "I-it da-doessn't ha-ha-hap-pen with v-v-vul-vul-FUCKITY FUCKING HELL . . . wor-words."  
  
"Oooooohhh." responded Nora, dragging out the sound with a slow nod. One of her feet remained behind her, ready to pivot and run at another outburst.  
  
          Neo swung her arms open, first turning sideways and swinging them toward the hole that was once a window, then spinning to gesture the entire room. Nora followed the movements with her eyes, taking in the fixable damage of misplaced furniture, the erasable whiteboard, and the window outside of their abilities to undo.  
  
"Oh, right, we're here because we were breaking too much stuff, huh? Well, what do we do now?" asked Nora, unsure as to how to fix this problem.  
  
          Neo shrugged, slid into her chair, and let her head fall to her book with her arms around, shielding her from any visual of the room. It was not long before the scraping of chairs, desks, and even Nora picking up her two remaining books carved through the defeated silence Neopolitan started. She a vaguely aware of Nora putting something in her own bag too. Most surprising, though, was the crinkling of glass being knocked away. _Does she really think they won't notice if the cracks aren't visible?_


	7. Group Detention

          There is something that should be said about windows: when all the windows in a room are tinted, however slight it is when looking out, it is very noticeable when one is missing despite a lack of visible cracks and regardless of the pile of glass on the ground three floors down.  
  
          When Professor Goodwitch had returned to the C floor of the building to release her captives the relief from finding two students sitting peacefully against the wall in what otherwise appeared to be an untouched room was torn from her grasp as she opened the second door.  
  
          It was not immediate, but the details quickly shone through; despite all the desks being as they should it was clear that not one was aligned quite straight, the board was smudged, although erased, and the two students within sat separately. It was the return of a sense of dread she noticed first, before picking up on those details. One student, located in the middle of the room had her book bag on her desk and seemed to be trembling with excess energy, turned her head to look at the professor before the door had even opened. The other with her head down on a text, the image of defeat, behind whom was a clean window, a very clean window.  
  
          Coco and Penny, standing just behind the professor, quickly turned away from the room in advance of those details registering in her mind. Both had a hand across her mouth, Penny in shock and horror, Coco attempting to snuff out any indication of laughter. Carefully the two of them looked at the other as Professor Goodwitch attempted to find her voice.  
  


* * *

  
          The next evening saw all four members of PNNC seated in room 16C, each in one of the four corners of the square desk arrangement. _Perhaps the well-mannered Penny and Coco could learn to control the destruction of their teammates this time._ Professor Goodwitch had said, as much a warning as an instruction.  
  
          Twas not long before Nora moved to sit atop the instructor's desk, cross-legged and leaning over a notebook open in her lap. She struggled to pay attention to her notes and doodles, shifting and stretching. Her hunched posture become a hindrance; she tried straightening out, turning sideways and pushing the book in front of her sitting form. Her form elongated as she sunk forwards, chest propped up using her arms, legs bent and gently kicking the air.  
  
          A few minutes of that and her separate rhythms met with one heel hitting her bum, her other foot hitting the metal side of the table, and a sucking 'click' from her mouth as her mumbled reading paused with a page turn.  
  
Coco stood abruptly, her chair slamming against the desk behind her, pushing the entire column into the wall, including the one Nora had started at. "Stop that!" she exclaimed.  
  
          Nora rolled to face the source of commotion, in her surprise she pushed off with too much force and rolled off the table. A weak 'ow' was all she spoke.  
  
Unperturbed, Coco continued. "Be quiet and stop twitching around! Just sit down properly," she waved a hand toward the desks behind her, "and study normally!"  
  
"Sssshe c-can't." replied Neopolitan calmly, seated in the desk closest to the windows in the same front row as Coco. It was a statement that shouldn't have needed to be said, they had known Nora long enough to understand her study habits. "A-and y-y-you kn-now it."  
  
          Nora stood at the front of the room, hesitant to resume her perch on the desk. Surprised the teammate that had ignored her for the past day had come to her defense, she turned to face Neopolitan.  
  
Penny spoke before Coco could retaliate, "We all know that Nora is not one to study in the traditional manner. Can we agree to allow her to do as she pleases within this room with the condition that she shall do nothing she cannot put back or fix before our period of confinement ends?"  
  
Nora's eyes twitched around the upper half of the back wall, attempting to understand Penny's suggestion.  
  
Faster, Coco grumbled as she sat back down, providing one additional caveat, "She had better be quiet and not bother me." Her attention turned to her book as she appended quietly, "I can't miss two nights of studying."  
  
"Certainly!" Penny hurried to respond, knowing better than to allow comment on Coco's second remark. "Actually, Coco, would it help if you move to the desk in the back row?" she offered, extending a hand to indicate the spot in her same row, previously warmed by Nora.  
  
Coco gathered her things as Neopolitan watched her teammates intently.  
  
          Nora promised that she would be respectful of the study time and agree to the terms laid out by Penny and Coco. First she covered the blackboard with a mural of herself riding an ursa, leading an ursa army over the corpses of beowolves. It spanned the entire board, and most of Nora's arms and skirt as a result of her hasty erasures and artful blending of the colored chalk.  
  
          Once satisfied, Nora spun on her toes and looked about the room as she dusted her hands. The room was not decorated, and the majority of it was comprised of the currently unused desks and chairs. Choosing to start with the corner desk Coco had been at not long before, she placed it beside the teacher's desk. It sat a little lower. Another went to the other side, then one atop each of the short desks to the table at a slant. Most of the unused desks were soon part of her carefully crafted structure, even building from the long sides of the table to support it. Chairs were placed on top for embellishment with one at the very top, centered, where Nora sat observing her dominion.  
  
          Her dominion was small, a mere three subjects whose heads were bowed and fields cleared apart from the few remaining chairs. Carefully, her attention turned to the mural depicting her heroic battle to protect her fiefdom which earned her the love of her subjects and a new crown. However, not all her subjects were happy. One section rose against the queen when she was turned away and took hold of a desk leg.  
  
          Coco had pulled the desk free and jumped back. Nora felt her carefully crafted world wobble and tilt, ready to crash down around her. She pushed off from her throne, up and back, her feet planting just above the board behind her and launching her to the door-wall, opposite the windows, from which she fell to the floor with a roll, ending back on her feet.  
  
CRASH!  
  
Coco was sliding back into her own seat by the time Penny and Neopolitan looked up to see the pile of furniture come crashing down.  
  
Penny looked from the front of the room, to Nora, then the other two, attempting to piece together what happened. A snicker came from Neopolitan.  
  
Nora twisted her stance toward Coco, demanding "What was that for!?"  
  
It took a moment before Coco looked up from the book she was not reading. "What? Me? Nooo I was sitting here quietly, minding my own studies."  
  
"Liar! You pulled the desk out! I was entertaining myself without bothering you or breaking anything and you made all the desks and chairs come crashing down!" accused Nora, her voice wavering in frustration.  
  
"But you didn't!" retorted Coco, standing up and letting go of her pretext. "Every scrape of a chair, and the whole thing was bound to fall down anyway!"  
  
"Nu-uh! I was careful and I made sure it wasn't and I was going to be able to take it down the same way I built it so that nothing got broken and nothing crashed. _You_ are the one that made the big distracting noise."  
  
With each of her own utterances of the word 'you', Coco stepped forward. "You just couldn't sit still. You just _had_ to break something. We are only here today because _you_ couldn't just study like a normal student. _You_ thought it was a good idea to throw a desk at a window and break it. What would you have done if the desk went through it? Try to get it up the stairs without being noticed?"  
  
          Penny was getting to her feet, looking between her three teammates unsure of how to diffuse this situation. A hand was placed on Penny's shoulder encouraging her to not get closer, and it's source was the first to speak while a stunned Nora stood frozen.  
  
"C-c-coco, n-noth-nothing br-roke b-bef-fore y-y-you p-p-ulled th-the des-sk."  
  
"Yeah!" said Nora, picking up where Neopolitan left off. "Now we'll be in trouble all over again because you couldn't let me be like we all agreed. I was just minding my own b-"  
  
Coco cut her off, "No. Yesterday should've been it. Done. You two couldn't hold yourselves together for three hours. _Three hours._ " responded Coco, now addressing both Nora and Neo. "So now we have to do it all over again, and you were scraping the floor," she pointed at Nora, then switched to Neopolitan, "and you are laughing, while I'm sitting in this horribly hard chair attempting to study, waiting for it to all go to hell and us be stuck here again."  
  
          Penny reached to move between them but Neopolitan's hand remained on her shoulder. Neo was waiting, waiting for just the right moment. Coco punctuated the end of her list of complaints by kicking a fallen chair into the air and using a hand to slam it towards Nora; it hit the wall and floor at once, the wood exploding upon impact. Nora bent, grabbing a chair as she dodged, using her entire torso to whip it at her aggressor.  
  
Neopolitan smiled, dropping her hand from Penny's shoulder at the sound of the latter's back opening. Easily dodged by Coco, the second chair flew past Penny and broke against the back wall.  
  
"STOP THIS!" shouted Penny, her arms up, as she took a step toward the center of the room, away from her partner. "Events such as these are precisely why we have been confined to this room as punishment. We are here to find respite for ourselves, our peers, and our educators. We must not continue this pattern of destruction." she entreated.  
  
Neopolitan offered her own solution with a smile to Coco and nearly submissive tilt of her head. "I th-think Coco ou-ought t-t-to b-be th-the one to c-cl-cleann th-this up. C-can y-y-ou f-fix ch-chairs?"  
  
          Coco roared, furious at the insinuation that she was the only one to blame, and looked at a desk to serve as her next projectile. After all, building a large throne of desks and chairs is hardly appropriate behavior for detention. Nora was quick to agree with Neo, but before she voiced a full syllable Penny shouted again.  
  
"Cease!" ordered Penny. Six blades hovered behind her and with a few quick motions two launched for each of her teammates head-on.  
  
Neopolitan was quickly pinned up between windows, too close and too surprised to dodge. Nora jumped to avoid them but she was easily affixed to the wall which held the door, closer to the front of the room than the door.  
  
          Coco jumped back, then to the side. The blades followed her, Penny turned her body to better direct them. Coco moved side to side but always back, until she was against the wall; one blade pinned her sleeve, the other found her scarf just above her opposite shoulder.  
  
          Three students, trapped more from shock than force, were attached to three different walls with the fourth standing in the center, wary of who might be the first to move, arms out and ready to respond. They were only half way through this detention, and had an hour and a half to repair as much as they could.  
  
The door opened before any one of them had gathered her wits enough to speak. Professor Goodwitch stepped into the room, enough to see the three students in easy view, and Nora with a slight twist.  
  
She took a step backwards into the hallway, closing the door in front of her.


	8. Communication

          Days of classes felt long at Beacon, despite fewer hours of lecture as compared with the combat schools, yet gaps between classes and afterward were still occupied with academic pursuits. Certainly not one of the better strategies, to stare at a book for hours and remove breaks if this form of studying becomes difficult, though a student is able to feel accomplished through the number of hours instead of progress.  
  
          It was this method that lead Neopolitan to suggest that Penny practice with her, combat instead of research, as a productive break. Supper had been settled in their stomachs for over an hour, and the stiff back of a studious student requires the occasional reprieve. Easily swayed to switch subjects of study by Neopolitan, Penny had accepted the invitation.  
  
          Satisfied with their release of energy, they acknowledged the need to return to their books. The silence between the partners as they walked side-by-side through the uncrowded corridor toward their dormitory room was interrupted by Penny.  
  
"You performed excellently, Neopolitan. Not that I would have anticipated anything less, of course."  
  
          Taking advantage of the pause in Penny's stride, Neopolitan stepped ahead of her to respond with a smile and slight bow of her head.  
  
          Penny was not done yet, her comment serving only as an opening for something more. "I have taken notice of your ability to plan your assault in such a way that your opponents are moved to a position conductive to your victory." she continued. "Your feints and dodges serve to direct your adversary to allow an opening, to your advantage."  
  
          Neopolitan's head bobbed up and down, not indicating if she knew what Penny was intending with this line of compliments, but indicating her attentiveness.  
  
"In a confrontation tactics are the quick decisions and short-range plans that allow for a dodge that one can strike from, or to combine a feint with a real attack so the attack is able to land on the target. In contrast, strategy is a plan that encompasses more than a few steps, connecting a first move to a victory. Strategy is the more useful of the two."  
  
          Penny put a hand to Neopolitan's shoulder and stopped, turning to face her partner and raising her second hand so that both rested upon her partner's shoulders.  
  
"You display strategy in your spars." said Penny, finally arriving at the point of this exposition. "Strategy is capable of coordinating a multi-pronged operation, such as that of a four-person team against a similarly disperse opponent. I am the leader of Team P-N-N-C. If a leader can only have one trait is it imperative for that trait to be 'wisdom'; the key tenant of wisdom is to understand strengths and weaknesses so that one may replace one's own weaknesses with the strengths of others. Neopolitan, my teammate and partner, I would like you to assist me with strategy."  
  
          They had traversed the hallway between buildings and reached that of the living quarters. Neopolitan had begun to bore of this monologue, that is, she found herself struggling to not jump back out of the heavy grip of her companion. It wasn't a strange reaction, to jump away when a once free shoulder is unexpectedly burdened. Nor was it uncommon for a person to flinch away from physical contact. Right? Well, perhaps not given that people kept touching her and she found herself repressing those reactions more and more. She was not prepared to give them up though, only hide them from her teammates.  
  
          In response to Penny's request, Neopolitan tapped her lips twice with her first finger - lips that smiled under her partner's anticipatory gaze. Directing people in a fight would require the ability to relay commands quickly, something Neopolitan was very much aware as an ability she did not possess. Another person, Coco for instance, might have made a joke by saying how she was not interesting in kissing Neo just then, but Penny was not that type of person.  
  
Instead, Penny immediately sought out alternative solutions. "Then we shall find another method of relaying your strategic knowledge." determined Penny brightly, with a smile and quick nod.  
  
Neopolitan blinked at Penny. She blinked many times. Each time her eyes opened they were a different color, flashing different combinations of three colours.  
  
"A flag system!" extrapolated Penny, beaming as she released her partner's shoulders. "Flag systems have been used to great effect to transmit messages, often in a military setting, before electronic systems were devised."  
  
          The two had resumed walking side-by-side, and Penny looked to Neopolitan for some confirmation. Neo glanced at Penny, their eyes meeting briefly before her attention turned back to the end of the hallway. It was a short moment of confusion before Penny's smile curved less and her shoulders lowered slightly.  
  
"That system would require at least one member of the team to always check or watch you for a signal. Such a system would be impractical in a combat setting."  
  
A nod was the response Neopolitan gave, allowing their stroll to fall back into silence until they reached their room.

 

* * *

 

"You're back!" an excited voice exclaimed too loudly from the doorway. Nora had apparently heard the lock click and rushed over, as indicated by her chair laying on the floor. Behind her, Coco laboriously raised her attention from her text, removing one of the two hands that had cradled her head.  
  
          Neopolitan stepped backwards, leaving Penny to press her way in with some murmurs of greeting and take the brunt of the energy not-quite-contained in Nora.  
  
          Interested in any distraction, Nora was keen to probe into the details of the spar. Penny quickly went over how neither bested each other, both were working to improve equally, and that the session had been productive. In the following lull an idea dawned on Penny, a recollection that Nora was skilled with forming interesting ideas.  
  
"There was one other thing that transpired in our absence." began Penny, her feet and head now turned to Nora instead of her lonely desk. "I suggested to Neopolitan that her input would be valuable in regard to team strategy, but she feels that hindrances to communication would cancel out any beneficial effect."  
  
The leader looked to Neo for confirmation, which was granted.  
  
"Although in conversation we can communicate adequately, social normative body movements do not directly apply to most combat situations. Using her eye colors as flags is another possibility, but would be difficult to relay to the team without someone constantly observing her."  
  
Nora looked between the two, Coco was watching the three of them as well, contemplating the problem they set before her. "I guess you need something to do with sound, since you ruled out two sight-based options." She crossed one arm over her body, and tapped her face with a finger from her other hand. "Sound would work. Can you whistle? No, too easy to miss. You don't much like talking, and even one word takes too long for you to say."  
  
At this, Neopolitan lowered her eyelids and sounded a growl through clenched teeth.  
  
"Well it's the truth!" retorted Nora, her arms falling to her sides as she leaned forward toward Neo. "Oh!" She jumped to the balls of her feet with a crooked smile, "But there _are_ words you can say without problems . . ."  
  
          Penny looked from Nora to Neopolitan, unsure of what had just been suggested. Stifled snickering came from Coco, punctuated by the legs of her tilted chair clicking against the floor. Neopolitan, though, returned a similar smile to Nora, then turned her head to Penny.  
  
"Fuck." said Nora and Neo in unison, both watching Penny for recognition.  
  
Thud.  
  
          Coco fell backward, her chair having lost its balance. Arms clutched about her waist, she was laughing too hard to speak or for any noise save for gasps of air to leave her mouth. Still, she put forth a valiant effort, there was something she was desperately attempting to add to the conversation.  
  
"Shit attack go!" called out Nora, ignoring her partner's plight, thrusting a fist into the air.  
  
Penny clasped a palm to her forehead and slid it down her face slowly.


	9. Revenge

          The hum of overhead lights was audible in the hallway; it was so late at night that it was early morning, and even the most determined of students had succumbed to the allure of their cozy beds. Well, all save for two.  
  
"SHHHHH" punctuated Nora, loudly hushing her silent accomplice while her own shoeless footsteps were not entirely muffled by the carpeting.  
  
Understandably, Neopolitan replied with with a stare that bespoke several unspoken comments of incredulity.  
  
What's that?  
  
Incredulity means disbelief. Imagine that dead-pan look when someone says 'really?' after you say something obvious or dumb.  
  
Ohhhhhh  
  
          Continuing on: Providing no indication of having noticed her teammate's response, Nora pressed forward, her back arched and feet rising high with each step in an exaggerated creep. This faulty impersonation of a sneaky person deepened as they neared their destination. Neo was glad, as she followed behind and stifled a laugh, and more importantly the urge to take a photo, that she was the one gingerly carrying the triple-bagged instrument of revenge.  
  
For revenge was what this was.  
  
          After the expected retaliation from the cookie 'incident', Coco had held a team meeting. Penny, unwilling to lie to her teammates had nearly turned Coco's fury onto her partner, Nora, but had settled for a ban on further escalation. Said partner turned to Neopolitan later that day, wanting to get back at those who had done such a great injustice on the whole team, but specifically upon Coco and Neo. Nora vowed to Neopolitan that they would come up with something bad enough that team RWBY would be the ones to surrender defeat.  
  
          Neopolitan's first contribution was that they should wait, let them think they were safe, an arduous task for Nora but her fantasies of elaborate contraptions of playful torture pacified her for a few days.  
  
          It had taken quite some time to sort out that mess, too. A two pronged attack could hardly be considered fair, especially one that attacked all four team member specifically. Thankfully, clean uniforms for classes were in ample supply.  
  
          The two members of team PNNC had arrived at the door of their unfortunate targets - team RWBY. They had come from the kitchens, not their room. Nora made a grand gesture toward the scroll-reader lock, holding the ridiculous pose as she waited on her accomplice.  
  
          Taking great pains to not jostle the plastic bag much, Neopolitan carefully reached her free hand to her backpack to a sidepocket. The zipper was resistant to being opened by a single hand, but with Nora's bubbling excitement it wasn't long before she broke her pose to retrieve the peculiar item from the pouch.  
  
          Nora then held the top of the backpack for Neo so that she could slowly slide out of it, the plastic-bagged item switching hands with the utmost caution. A single finger on the bottom of the backpack was all the indication Neo needed to give for Nora to raise the pack with the pockets facing Neo instead of letting it hang low by her side; there was one last, small, item she would need.  
  
          Neo nodded to Nora who in turn held up the strange device, the innards of an outdated scroll, toward the lock in a silent question.  
  
          Maybe team RWBY had not known about the water fight, and it was merely their luck. Perhaps their elaborate prank would have gone unnoticed. Someone could had let team RWBY in on the secret of the upperclassmen but maybe it had been a precaution, so that phase two would not be permanent, and the first part was a happy accident for them.  
  
          It was predicted to be the last really warm weekend of the season and it seemed that there were fewer students inside than could fit into a single classroom. Freshman had mostly eaten in the cafeteria, with any upperclassmen that ate breakfast taking it out with them; as a result, most favorite spots were taken except for those in the lawn along the dormitories.  
  
          It all started with some water-balloons from the roof and windows. The fastest freshmen found the landscaping hoses or ran inside for supplies or shelter. The upperclassmen were ready, though, prepared with food-tray shields, cardboard umbrellas, and dust users stocked with water dust and supplied by less-adept partners. That would have been enough, unpleasant but fun and jovial, except that team PNNC's clothing turned white on contact, no, not quite turned, a white foam sprouted up from it.  
  
Where was I? Yes, the door in the hallway.  
  
          Neopolitan nodded with a tilt of her head to the door. A deep breath steeled her resolve before she slid into the room. Nora was holding the door, closed but not able to latch, listening but unable to watch.  
  
          The bag was pushed under the first pair of bunkbeds, Yang and Blake's, with Neo sprawled on her front, her head nearly under the bed. When the bag was just short of her reach her second hand brought the small object to the plastic, the fork twice pierced the triple-bagged weapon with a quiet 'pop' utilizing a quick spin of the bag.  
  
          Neopolitan's plan was to take a week after the initial arrangements, a fact that did not please Nora but she had been convinced. They had snuck into the kitchen, collected anything that seemed useful, and placed it all in a plastic bag that they then knotted tightly. A second bag was placed around it and tied, as well as a third. The ball was no larger than an average cantaloupe in the end when they placed it outside the kitchen door in the weeds along the wall.  
  
          A third jab for good measure and Neopolitan slid back, leaving the contaminated fork behind, kicked Yang's clothing to conceal that any had moved in the operation, and exited as quickly as she could do so silently. Nora opened the door as her mental count to 15 seconds ended. Someone rolled over in bed, and in Neo's rush her socked feet slid out from under her. Nora was just in range to reach out with both arms, her hip holding the door, to catch her thankfully silent companion.  
  
          Soap in clean clothing wasn't the end of the precursor to this though. None of PNNC had yet to figure out just how RWBY had managed to do it, the dryer and sneaking into closets being the most likely of options. When the team found other contaminated clothing and set about washing all them it was striking just how _blue_ all their clothes were out of the washer. They had yet to hear of any casualties outside of their team but it was difficult to imagine such thoroughness not stretching beyond the boundaries of a single team.  
  
          Neopolitan exhaled, then gasped, once the door clicked shut behind them, afraid to risk a single whiff. Nora grinned, a hand flying to her mouth to hush a giggle. The smile was returned and the backpack once more on Neopolitan's back, with the device hidden inside, before they entered their own room.


	10. Morals

With a laugh, a voice traveled beyond a circle of friends into the hallway, "Yeah, this test is going to be hard, but I can still do better than someone who just smashes her way through life." He moved a fist up and down, bending at the elbow, making it clear to whom he was referring.  
  
"Seriously," said another in the group with a chuckle, "she's gotta be cheatin' off her boyfriend to have not failed out. This is _Beacon_ , hitting stuff hard isn't enough to be here."  
  
A female student exiting the classroom beside the group serendipitously picked up speed as she weaved through her peers.  
  
Another voice of the group chimed in, "I don't like your face, let me break it for you."  
  
The first student built upon the comment, his voice now higher. "I don't understand this question, I'll just smash it."  
  
"You're killing me!" one of them cried, the words barely coming through his laughter. "I bet that's how she gets through classes, the teachers get tired of broken desks."  
  
When the voices had faded into the inaudible hum of a populated hallway the young woman felt a hand on her shoulder from someone behind her. The book she held hindered her thrust fist enough that she could avoid hitting her team leader.  
  
Nora slowed and moved to the side in the slightly less-packed corridor, allowing Penny to walk beside her.  
  
"Nora," began Penny, her attention and gaze on her companion more than the path in front of her. "Why did you not stop or react to those students as you normally do, rashly and destructively?" There was a short pause that Nora failed to end, leading Penny taking the moment to clarify her question. "Not to imply that I feel you should do that, I most certainly do not wish to be in violation of school policy, but your lack of reaction seems uncharacteristic. Is it possible that you are ill?"  
  
"No." replied Nora, stopping unexpectedly. She might have gone on in silence but she knew Penny would just continue along the same line of questioning undeterred. "I didn't do anything because there was nothing I could do that wouldn't make it worse. Even ignoring them might've given 'em more fuel."  
  
"I am not sure I quite understand." said Penny. "If you were to have asked them to stop I would have stood behind you. I would have done so if you had behaved as you normally do, as well, although with trepidation."  
  
Nora shook her head. "It doesn't work like that, Penny." she said. "It would just give them more stuff to talk about, making it worse. Asking wouldn't get 'em to stop."  
  
"How is that so?" Penny asked.  
  
"Well . . . " Nora trailed off, a rare moment when the right words were just out of grasp. "I think the way Ren explained it to me a long time ago was that the root of it is that once bullies pick a person they can and will find a way to use anything a person does or says against them."  
  
"Root . . . ?"  
  
"Yeah." replied Nora with a nod. She took a slow step forward to suggest that they continue on their way. "It took awhile for me to get that far with him, but that what was at the bottom of the problem. Basically, if I had said something to them they would see it bothered me and do it more. Telling teachers or parents just means it will be worse when adults aren't around. That leaves my usual reaction to bullies, but you heard them -" she used a hand to indicated behind her, "it would have just proved them right."  
  
"Oh." stated Penny simply, in step with Nora. "There is nothing that can be done?"  
  
Nora nodded. "Yeah, basically."  
  
The two teammates walked in silence for a moment as Penny took the time to ruminate on what she had just been told, attempting to perhaps find another possibility, interrupted by a loud voice in a stairwell.  
  
The words were difficult to make out behind the closed door, but the tone leaked through, one of anger spoken from a smiling mouth. Nora had already veered from their usual route, with her hand on the door, when a second voice cried out.  
  
The door banged into the wall before Penny could alter her course to follow Nora. By the time she caught up Nora was crossing onto the next landing up where an older female student stood and a first year knelt on the floor.  
  
As fast as Penny assessed the situation, Nora sent her fist into the gut of the woman. Although aura likely shielded the student in entirety, surprise and force still pushed her back.  
  
Nora threw a kick into the upperclassman's chest, who stumbled backwards into the wall and started to slide down. Another fist was ready to slam her into the wall, stopping her decent, but Penny had been in time to stop the third hit from meeting its target.  
  
Ignoring the arm and the person holding it, Nora shifted her attention to the freshman on the floor. He met her gaze but she looked through it, seeing only the two ears pinned to the top of his head and the tear in his shirt.  
  
Penny let go of Nora, but remained standing near the upperclassman. Freed from restraint, Nora crouched in front of her classmate.  
  
After Nora had verified no significant physical harm had been inflicted, and Penny had concluded that Nora was likely not going to escalate her own violence, the faunus ran out to the floor below and the upperclassman to the floor above the landing.  
  
Penny let the echos of the doors fade before speaking to Nora. "What was all of this about?"  
  
Nora stood up and turned to face Penny, her voice even and matter-of-fact. "She was picking on him. Didn't you notice?"  
  
"I did not notice until after you had already run forth, but I you has explained how stopping a bully would just make the situation worse mere minutes prior. Did you not recently conclude that there is nothing productive that can be done against a bully?"  
  
"Yep yep, that's true." Nora chewed her tongue and tossed her head side to side. "Well, sorta. There isn't anything the person they are bulling can do that'd help, BUT sometimes if someone else tells them they are being dumb it works. It's complicated."  
  
"The group outside the classroom might have stopped if I had told them to cease?" probed Penny, her brow furrowed in thought.  
  
Nora shook her head. "uh-uh. We're on the same team so you don't really count as a different person. It's more important to not laugh or let the bullies think that the people around them think it's cool when they say that mean stuff."  
  
"Please verify my summary of this matter, as the rules seem to vary with slight situational alterations." Penny requested. "If one is being bullied, or a close associate, it is better to simply ignore it and prevent the antagonists from getting the reactions they seek. However, if such a situation is seen then it remains productive to request they cease or to forcibly stop it. Does this seem to be correct?"  
  
"Yes." came Nora's reply. "Except that people like teachers don't count, because if they stop it then it will just start back up once they walk away, but they still have to stop it if they see it." The sentence, however, was meek in comparison to her 'yes'; Nora was unwilling to over-complicate the conditions before clearing up Penny's current point of confusion, which she suspected was being led to.  
  
That assumption was correct.  
  
"How does inaction in any circumstance hold as acceptable given the contradiction with our intentions as huntresses to protect all sentient life? There is a moral and oath requirement that we do all that we can to protect and act against deviant and anti-social behavior."  
  
Nora sighed, recalling that there are some small things of which Penny has no prior knowledge. "We do, but that includes not doing stuff that hurts people more, doesn't it? Besides, it's only us that we can't defend, and putting ourselves in harm's way is basically part of being a hunter, no?"  
  
Nora's words began to sway Penny, and as her questions became smaller and farther apart they made their way from the stairwell back along the route to their original destination, their room.


	11. Room

          There had been a plan for the whole team to work together to clean up their room, both of normal messes and the aftermath of that morning, directly upon the completion of brunch. Strangely enough, Penny and Coco found themselves standing in their room, alone, with their non-class time earmarked for chores. Well, perhaps not so oddly.

  
          Nora, who had gotten up to clear her tray with Ren, had failed to return to the table. Shortly thereafter Neo left the cafeteria with the remainder of JEPR, never one to stray far from those she can easily steer into trouble. A shared look between Coco and Penny had been the extent of their remarks at the empty table, however, with a growing understanding that given the events of that morning the task might go faster without them.  
  
          A mattress prevented the door to the hallway from opening fully, its former frame propped upon a mostly-untouched bed by the two feet that had been the foot of the bed when made. Sheets were draped over a gap between two bed-frames resting on their long sides, feet pointed inward and holding the cloth roof up, pinned in place by a dresser perched atop it precariously - opposite corners of the wooden box balanced one per bed frame, just barely reaching. One mattress made a third wall, leaning tall over the windows, the final one presumably inside the fort.  
  
          One closet door was closed, a dresser pushed in front of it and a desk resting on top; a trail of books, papers, and writing tools led from where it had originally been located. The bathroom beside it was inaccessible, a pile of clothes prohibiting the door from opening. With high steps over obstacles Penny worked her way to her corner of the room. Looking from her misplaced desk to the start of the paper trail she was unsure where to begin, with the school supplies or the desk they belong on, so she turned to Coco.  
  
          Coco walked on the mattress toward the fort, cautiously peeking in. Similar to the rest of the room, there was a pile of boxes and clothing that had been under the beds, but inside the fort these items were piled almost neatly in comparison, leaving the inside mattress clear. All three displaced mattresses had retained their fitted sheet, at least partially, and the one along the window had a regular sheet still clinging to it, but curiously this mattress had retained its blankets and had managed to accrue pillows from another bed as well.  
  
She placed a hand on the right bed-frame, farthest from Penny and closest to the other closets, but paused and stared at the dresser.  
  
Penny saw this hesitation, "I will help you!" she said quickly. In her hurried attempt to reach Coco before restraint was lost she tripped on a dresser drawer free from its native home and fell forward, landing on it and a pair of shoeboxes with a sound that implied something broke.  
  
"Penny?" inquired Coco, turning quickly to see the state of her teammate. A groan was her response, but it gave way to limbs moving slowly into a position to lift up from.  
  
"I was going to suggest we attempt to not inflict further destruction." said Penny, finding some solid ground and springing back to her feet. "I might retract that recommendation shortly."  
  
Coco smiled, a small chuckle escaped her chest and closed lips. "Sure, I can wait and we'll take the dresser down properly."  
  
          Gingerly, Penny plotted a path through the figurative minefield and reached the side of the fort closest to her. The two young women each took a corner, lifting the dresser straight up and attempting to balance it despite them holding adjacent corners. Coco slid the bulk from between them to Penny, who turned and let it plunk to a sparely covered area of the floor, mostly cloth from bedding and clothing. Not quite balanced, the drawers that had been held shut by gravity rolled open and pulled the bulk of the dresser to fall on its front.  
  
          Penny reached out a hand and winced, but let it go, her attention taken by a metallic crash, followed by a second that bounced against the first. Coco had lightly pushed the one bed-frame toward the three closest and the sheet coupled with a lack of opposing force had pulled the second down atop it.  
  
Penny shook her head and began clearing floorspace for those two beds and the frame on her bed. "Do you have any ideas with regard to what could be done to stop these incidents?" asked Penny, aiming to open the room to conversation more than looking for answers.  
  
Coco shook her head, "If only." She smiled, tossing things out of the way. "I think we'd have a chance if it wasn't for Neo."  
  
A tossed shoe tumbled a newly-formed pile.  
  
"It is odd to consider, Neopolitan being as quiet as she is, but she seems well-versed in escalating a situation." said Penny.  
  
"Yep, she likes pushing buttons and then grinning like a deranged maniac when everything goes to hell." agreed Coco, setting them both to a modest laugh.

 

* * *

 

          Soon they made room for the bed frames to be where they belonged, and had the mattresses set upon them. Taking a pause, the two teammates slowly turned, surveying the remaining tasks to tackle.  
  
          Much of the floor clutter had been pushed and heaped against the wall in three sections, each nestled between two beds and spreading sideways, threatening to slide underneath and be forgotten. Some boxes had been tossed onto the beds, along with pillows and balled-up bedding, which for one included most of the fitted sheet as well.  
  
          Although Penny's bed and closet were mostly untouched, her school work had been tucked between the desk-and-dresser barricade still in place as guard of her closet. On the other side of the room, not one closet had been addressed and not one of the three could close. One was ajar no more than a hand's width. The out-facing side of the middle closet door was adorned with a poster for a band with a lightning-bolt logo, and held open by a pile of clothing spilling from its confines, which may or may not have been clean. The final door was also tasked with too large a burden, but its contents arranged neatly, including the tidy boxes at the floor that would never allow the door to latch.  
  
          The next task was to get the desks and dressers back to their proper locations, picking up items and tossing them on the bed of their owner or kicking them into a floor pile. Nora's clothing was left in front of the bathroom, temporarily. Going through the dorm deeper with each pass they eventually sorted through the heaps between the beds as well.  
  
          Penny scooped the pile of Nora's clothing into her arms and walked to the closet in which they belonged, the middle one, her feet dragging a few items that had spilled from her grasp. Coco was ahead of her, in two steps she was at the door, hand on the knob. There was a plan, born from caution on the high probability of unintentional booby traps: Coco would open the door, Penny would toss the clothing in, kicking the articles on the floor all the way in, then jump back so Coco could close the door before anything jumped out.  
  
          It almost worked. A blanket fell from the overhead shelf and blocked the door. They tossed that back in and tried again. Something hard hid within the clothing already on the floor of the closet, blocking the door as well. They both knelt to shove it in, which ended up requiring the item to be lifted at an angle, quite possibly a hanger. A short few words passed between them and Coco stood up. They counted to three and Penny pulled her arms back as Coco tried to slam the door shut a third time. It worked.  
  
Penny rolled back, stopping herself in a reclined sit, breathing hard with relief. "I suppose that will be her problem."  
  
Coco snorted and looked to Nora's bed. "Well, it is if she is sleeping in here tonight, I don't think that'll all fit under her bed even if she does take the time to put it under nicely."  
  
"Ha, that will never happen."  
  
"Of course not." Coco laughed out, falling to a sit herself. "What's next?"  
  
Penny looked around the room, Coco's gaze following a similar path. "I would like to fix up my desk but that pile on Neopolitan's bed is worrisome."  
  
"Agreed, same plan?"  
  
"Sure." Penny lazily replied with a sigh, jumping to her feet.  
  
Coco pushed from the floor slowly, groaning as though moving took a great effort.  
  
Penny's arms were laden with likely-unbreakable items, and Coco was once more in position, now at the closet door merely slightly ajar. Coco gave it a tentative push; there was some give but it wouldn't shut.  
  
"You're going to need to kick it in." Coco warned, to which Penny nodded.  
  
          The door swung open, Penny tossed in her load, and a net shot out from the upper back of the closet, weighted with magnets that promptly latched to the floor. She cried out and fell backwards, a nimble Coco maneuvering out from behind her but caught in the same trap.  
  
          Just as their shouts of surprise died away a whirring sound was emitted from where the net came, along with a multi-point laser sight. Following the tether of the net toward its source, it seemed to be attached to the weapon, a silent threat against struggling or cutting its wire-strengthened rope.

 

* * *

 

          As the discussion about how they ended up trapped, why, and how to get free, already circular, began to grow louder and more heated, the door to the room opened and was slammed shut.  
  
          Penny and Coco looked over, meeting the mismatched eyes that rested upon them after first scanning the room for a threat. Neo's thoughts were still on the situation she had just escaped, her face serious with wide eyes before her laughter took over and she bent forward clutching her sides.  
  
"Stop that you insufferable brat!" Coco was unwilling to allow Neo time to compose herself.  
  
Neopolitan opened her mouth to respond but no sound escaped, serving only to gasp for air.  
  
"What the hell goes on in your head that setting a trap on your closet seems like a good idea?" continued Coco. "Get us out of this."  
  
Penny placed a hand on Coco's shoulder, an attempt to calm her teammate down as a grin began to crack on her own face.  
  
"B-blue," Neo managed to choke out, her laughter gradually subsiding and coming under control.  
  
Coco growled, unwilling to accept that excuse as the reasonable catalyst for a trap that it was.  
  
"Please free us from this trap, Neopolitan. We were merely attempting to right our shared living quarters." pleaded Penny.  
  
Coco jumped on Penny's comment, removing the intent of peace. "Yeah, _shared_ , and yet we were the only two here working on fixing this mess despite us all agreeing to clean it up _together_."  
  
Neo rolled her eyes and stood back up. She walked to the closet, reaching up toward the shelf on her toes before she paused and dropped to her heels, looking at her entrapped teammates.  
  
"Don't you dare." warned Coco, fully reading the threat to leave them there. "I know where you sleep. You don't want to go there."  
  
          Neo smirked with a tilt of her head, pretending to weigh the costs and benefits of her options. With a shrug, and more growls from Coco, she once again reached up to the controls of the trap, disabling the magnets and the weapon they were connected to.


	12. Lunch

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (A text-graphic of the seating chart is supplied at the bottom of the chapter.)

          Sounds in the school cafeteria merged into a hum that dulled individual noises. A clatter of a tray or roar of laughter might occasionally break over the din and travel clearly, but those could still be missed. A long section of seating was taken up by PNNC with ease, their reputation keeping their table and the two to either side free from stragglers or other groups. They were joined by teams RWBY and JEPR, their group of twelve separated from any other students by at least three seats.

  
          A second-year team, CFVY, sat to one side of the group and served as the brave spark that lured other second years to the connected tables. Fox had greeted Coco, a friend from before Beacon, as he settled into his seat; across from him sat his partner Cinder, from which Emerald turned away to hide her gaze, busying herself in her plate.  
  
          On the other side of the group, sat Ren beside Nora who spoke animatedly with Penny and Ruby across from her, occasionally losing some food from her fork which she flicked around to make her point. Jaune was having difficulty keeping up, not sure where the lines of reality fit into the discussion but trying his best. Pyrrha to his left had been drawn into a discussion comparing Atlesian, Valen, and Minstrali style differences with Weiss and Coco. Yang had nearly given up following her sister's conversation, and of interrupting Blake's book, but unable to relate to the architecture and fashion conversation found herself attempting to draw Jaune into a discussion about the best way to stay awake in Port's class.  
  
          Neopolitan, similarly to her neighbors Blake and Emerald, ate silently, but instead of fixating her attention on a book or her plate she was strongly preoccupied with searching through the room of bustling students. Her eyes flicked from one student to the next, never giving any a full second as her eyes flashed through colours nearly as quickly. It was after Jaune and Ruby had returned with heaping second plates, full of the dishes they found most acceptable, and each with another plate of desserts to share, that Neo tapped the table between Coco and herself.  
  
          The energy through the hall had settled as students filtered out or found it less pressing to get food as soon as possible, yet still full with the occasional student eying the empty seats around them. Neo huffed, looking at the three talking across from her. Another tap on the table was unsuccessful. Neopolitan leaned back, allowing her to glance under the table, and kicked outward, quickly sitting back up. Directly in front of her, Coco yelped and finally turned to her.  
  
"What?!"  
  
          Neo jerked her head backward, twitching her eyes to the right. Coco followed the gesture but a confused expression indicated that she had not caught on. With a roll of her eyes Neopolitan tugged on her shirt near the collar and Coco looked back up, a smile catching on her lips.  
  
"Why, what an unfortunate smear of red that is." said Coco, leaning over her tray and speaking quietly. Having joined the game, she looked around assuming it was her turn. Turning to her devious teammate she casually pointed to a female student with her fork, one with an unfortunate gravy stain on the thigh of her pants, one that she might have noticed given the positioning of the book she carried.  
  
          Neo hid her smirk behind a hand, faking a yawn, then using the hand coyly pointed down their stretch of tables past Ren. A laugh erupted from Coco, who tried to seal it away quickly; the student had his shirt buttons one off with bedhead that no expert could manage intentionally. Coco searched around as Neo took a bite of her lunch, unwilling to be outdone with such a simple case despite the other having had additional time to prepare.  
  
          Weiss and Pyrrha had hardly noticed Coco's departure from the conversation but had now been drawn into a heated debate between Jaune and Yang. Yang has successfully pealed Jaune away with a topic about getting a large group game started in the lawn outside. His argument that including any of PNNC would have the entire faculty shut it down was immediately discarded by Nora, who paused her story to comment. She claimed that if they picked the right game, one that moved a lot or lacked anything that looked capable of damage, the faculty wouldn't be able to stop them. Now nearly the whole of the three-team group was arguing about the best game to get more students in and not get shut down; the exceptions were Coco, Blake, Neopolitan, and Emerald, although Yang was pushing Blake for some input who generally disagreed in an attempt to be left to her reading.  
  
          Coco settled on her newest mark, a female student wearing a short skirt over pajama pants and a large jacket that matched neither likely intended to hide an immodest top - a solid candidate for having woken up in the wrong dorm room not five minutes prior, getting a noon breakfast before the good food was gone. Neo snickered, taking a sip of her orange soda float to temper her reaction. Emerald, disinterested in their game found herself listening more and more toward the second-year students discussing their upcoming mission selection.  
  
          The two plates of desserts, which had slowly worked their way through the group, clinked against Coco and Blake's plates. Although some items were taken, or chunks missing from a sample, plenty to choose from remained. From the lack of conversation about them it could be surmised that none of the desserts had been found to be repulsive, as well as the lack of anyone demonstrating how hard a brownie was by tapping it against the table, for example. Blake liberated a cookie without a noticeable glance at the plate beside her empty one. In contrast, Coco poked each of the offerings on hers with the handle of her knife before selecting a square with a mix of light brown and dark brown that she couldn't name.  
  
          Lifting her hand from her orange desert drink, four of Neopolitan's fingers tapped her opposite wrist before she pointed over Coco's right shoulder. A student wearing multi-coloured, florescent shoes from a cheap brand with the toes wrapped in silver tape to hold the soles on, had gotten up to put away a tray. Tight, straight-legged, light blue, denim pants and a dark, grey-blue denim jacket both with holes and stitches from actual wear completed the ensemble. Coco quickly turned back around, her face red. Upon seeing Neo she could do nothing but slap a palm to her mouth, biting her third finger, in a failed effort to not laugh audibly. It truly wasn't fair for Coco to have to try to keep quiet when Neo was already laughing behind two hands.  
  
After some time to pull herself together, Coco spoke. "I don't think I can beat that, but how about a cheap knock-off of traditional Vacuo garb complete with a printed pattern?" She pointed with a dart of her eyes without waiting for a response.  
  
          Neo nodded, picking up a chocolate chip from the dessert plate beside Coco, and looked in the indicated direction only to see Yang, followed by Penny, taking their dishes up to the bins. Curious, Neo twisted the other way and saw that half their group had gotten up, with the remainder scraping plates, and Jaune pocketing a small container of chicken strips. She checked that Coco had noticed the end of the meal as well before standing up, tray in one hand and the other holding the drink she was noisily finishing. She let her left elbow brush Emerald's head as she passed, waking her from a trance.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, I did headcanon an 'n' ending for people of Atlas and Vale, 'i' for Minstral, and that Vacuo doesn't conjugate.
> 
> 'o's are empty spots and dashes are the breaks between tables, although they are all against each other forming a long table, as in the show.
> 
> Ren|Nora|Jaune|Pyrrha|-|Weiss|Coco| o . | o | - | o | o | Fox|Yatsu
> 
> .o |Penn|Ruby | Yang |-|Blake| Neo|Emer | o | - | o | o |Cind|Velvet


	13. Forever Fall

          Nora spun around, facing the red tops of the trees around her. She had run ahead the moment the transport landed, eager to find the biggest tree; research the previous night had suggested that older trees would have more and sweeter sap. Her pause was enough for her partner, caught off guard by the sudden dash, to catch up.  
  
Panting, Coco bent forward and rested her hands on her thighs. "Nora, what on Remnant is wrong with you? Goodwitch _just_ said that there are grimm out here and we need to stick together."  
  
Nora turned her attention away from the clouds toward her partner. "I'm going to find the best, sweetest sap in the whole forest, but I need to find the biggest tree; that isn't going to be where everyone else is."  
  
"Must you?" grumbled Coco, standing back up.  
  
"Yes!" said Nora with enough energy to bounce on her toes.  
  
"And how do you plan to go about finding it?" asked Coco.  
  
"Well . . ." began Nora, looking back at the trees encircling them. "I kinda just expected to run past a really huge one, but this forest is super big and none of the ones I've seen are hugely old." She paused, a finger brought up to scratch her hairline before thrusting it in the air. "I know! I'll get up really high, like the tippy top of a tree and surely then I'll find the big, ancient one with mystical properties."  
  
"Mystical properties?" questioned Coco, her arms newly crossed under her chest.  
  
"Yeah! Like in movies but the mystical powers of sugar and sweetness!"  
  
"Sweetness, eh?" mumbled Coco, unheard by Nora who had already run toward a tree.  
  
          The first attempt failed, her fingers just shy of the first branch from her leap off the trunk. She backed up and tried again, focusing on pushing off from the trunk, and succeeded. After she pulled herself up scaling the rest of the tree was easy and she quickly disappeared from Coco's sight.  
  
          Several minutes later Coco's gaze sharpened and turned upward, triggered by the sound of breaking branches. The first few were smashing against lower ones, one broke in half, one shattered into splinters, and two each took out another limb. That wasn't all, more limbs were freshly broken from above and a sound, quiet at first, slowly out-shined them all. Twas a shout, a shout that was morphing into coherent syllables.  
  
"JER-AN-NA-MOOOOOOoooo"  
  
          By the time Nora could see the ground her hammer was out and catching on limbs of the tree, bringing many down, as it slowed her descent. When she was a handful of branches from the bottom she raised the hammer overhead and twisted so that its shaft was caught between two thick limbs. Not wasting the momentum, or letting it pull off her arms, she flipped her feet over her head, turned her hammer so as to unhook it, and landed lightly with her feet on the ground.  
  
"Ta-da!" announced Nora, holding her hands and weapon over her head then taking a bow toward some point beside Coco.  
  
"Well now we know why all the trees are of this smaller variety." Coco said to an imaginary person next to her. She stepped closer to Nora, "Done?"  
  
"Yep! I fou-" she failed to finish her sentence, interrupted by something only she had noticed and started searching for, her head swiveling side to side. Confirmed with a growl, her grip on Magnhild tightened, an action mirrored by Coco gripping the handle of her bag.  
  
          A trio of beowolves moved within view. Coco waited for the one nearest her to lunge and Nora charged the other two which were standing just a little too close together. All three were violently batted away, Coco's with her bag and Nora's with a wide swing that pushed one into the other and sent them both into a tree with a yelp.  
  
The two students slowly moved closer as the beowolves recovered. By the time the beowolves were up and approaching, more cautiously now, the two students were back-to-back.  
  
"This is why running off is a bad idea." said Coco.  
  
"You scared? I can take two if all you can handle is one." Nora retorted, the smile evident in her tone.  
  
"Ha, never, but I'll be nice and let you have two of them if you want to take a beating so badly. I'll rescue you once I'm done."  
  
CRACK  
  
CRASH  
  
          A tree from just beyond their line of sight broke and fell, taking parts of other trees in the process judging by the noise. Loud footsteps and a roar indicated that whatever it was was going to save them the trouble of finding it. Just as an ursa major came into view, the three beowolves lunged.  
  
          Nora swung her hammer, this time using dust to propel it, but the first beowolf ducked, leaving only the second to roll to the feet of the ursa. Coco's bag caught hers on the underside, the swing lifting it up into the air, luckily landing on the beowolf around to grab Nora's arm. Nora switched to an overhead swing, the top grimm got out of the way but the other's head was smashed into the ground, mask and skull shattered. She wasn't done, the handle of the hammer swung around, catching the final beowolf and throwing it, too, at the ursa, this one hitting it in the face.  
  
Nora laughed at the hit. "Score! Hey, Coco, why'd I have to handle all three?"  
  
"Because you're awesome." replied Coco, lacking the enthusiasm her partner displayed. "Can you keep all three busy for a minute?"  
  
"Yep!" called Nora, already running toward the ursa and two remaining beowolves.  
  
          Coco hung back, spared from attack thanks to Nora's charge. Magnhild launched a grenade at the neck of the ursa, the recoil allowing Nora to start a spin toward the bewolves and with another revolution, the ursa's legs. She didn't get that far though; the three grimm disbursed when faced with the grenade, dodging it and encircling her. Nora launched herself into the air with an explosion, and at the apex of her flight she loosed another, sending her down with the equivalent force of two. She swung her hammer, spinning as she did so, and slammed into the softened spot where she had been standing. The grimm, stunned by the first shockwave, were forced back as the ground beneath them shifted.  
  
"Hey, you're supposed to keep them grouped!" Coco called out to Nora.  
  
"Yeah yeah, I'm getting to that." replied her partner.  
  
          A quick dash and a side swing sent the beowolf farthest from the other two grimm careening into the other. Nora launched herself closer, between the three grimm and Coco, before proceeding to cautiously twirl her hammer like a flag, stepping closer to the grimm and gradually driving them back. The ursa swiped at her, an attack she dodged with a duck and roll, which one of the beowolves attempted to exploit. In response an upward hit tossed it a couple metres into the air, enough to stall the grimm but only briefly as it soon recovered onto its feet.  
  
"Move!" shouted Coco, the hum of her mini-gun starting to spin threatening to drown out any other words. She held the weapon, fully transformed, loaded and aimed, with a finger over the trigger ready to pull the moment the weapon was ready.  
  
          Nora lacked any hesitation; first she darted straight away from Coco just past the ursa, then changed course to the side, trajectory curving around to end behind her partner. The timing was impeccable, a product of practice; Nora was out of range of the center target the moment the rounds started firing, and as the first side pass followed her she had just enough of a head start to be past the pivot point as the spray turned for the second pass. The grimm had not quite seconds to react to the departure of their prey before they were crippled by the gunfire and ceased to exist with the subsequent pass.  
  
          The trees behind the grimm seemed to explode with the splinters. Spikes of wood impaled the ground like a hail of arrows before the two students, their aura deflecting the ones that directly threatened them. In the time it took for the air to settle enough to verify the battle was over, a deathly silence remained, hovering over the mangled and fallen trees.  
  
          The tree Nora had climbed, spared from the destruction of the fight, was streaked red, each line having origins from where a branch was now missing. The ground, perpetually carpeted in red leaves, now glistened with a similarly coloured liquid. The grimm, too, were streaked and speckled with a viscous, red residue. Past them the remains of trees demonstrated the source of the substance.  
  
"Can we go back to the group now?" Coco appealed, coaxing her weapon to fold back into the bag.  
  
Nora shook her head, both in response and to shake out fragments of wood. "No, no, I have to get to the _biggest_ tree."  
  
"Well the jars and taps are with everyone else."  
  
"Oh." replied Nora, hooking her compacted hammer to her back. "Well, let's get jars, _then_ go off to find the biggest tree."  
  
"You aren't going to experiment? Test different size trees yourself? You _do_ test your ammo and tried other types, right?" questioned Coco, testing the handle of her bag before tossing the strap over her shoulder and turning to Nora. "Right?"


	14. Field Trip

Nora pointed past the other students with an empty jar held tightly in her hand. "The big tree is that way." she said.  
  
"Why not just try these?" suggested her partner, whose gaze flitted from her to the rest of their team.  
  
Nora's arm dropped to her side and her torso twisted to size up the trees around their friends. "They aren't the super big one?" she stated, unsure as to why it was necessary to point out the obvious. She pressed further, even taking a step in her intended direction. "Come on Coco. Or I could just go alone . . . "  
  
"Nora, we should stay with the group, there are grimm, remember?" Coco persisted.  
  
"We took care of them just fine! It was easy. Don't you remember?" retorted Nora with a tone of insistence behind her words.  
  
"Yes, but," Coco stepped closer and leaned in, her voice changing to a whisper, "but do you remember that Penny really wanted this trip to be simple? She'd be so happy if you stayed with the group and didn't wander off."  
  
"Well," Nora looked at the rest of her team "I suppose. But do you promise we can go adventuring for the biggest tree another time?"  
  
Coco let out her held breath. "Yes." she said as a smile crept upon her. "It's more fun hanging out with everybody anyway."  
  
          With glances over her shoulder to be assured Nora was following, Coco led them to the rest of the group. Yang split her conversation with Emerald with pauses of eavesdropping on Ruby and Penny, who were speaking energetically, unaware that Weiss was excluded. Ren was knelt at a tree, filling a jar while Pyrrha closed the previous one.  
  
"Hi!" a chipper voice announced beside Ren, Nora having appeared there oddly quickly.  
  
Ren smiled and looked away from the tree to her. "You finally decided to join us?"  
  
"Of course! How could I go on a grand adventure without you?" she replied without missing a beat. "I mean, I sorta did what with the ursa and beowolves but I thought you'd be right behind me so I don't know if that should really count. Oh, but you should have come Ren; it was awesome! Coco blew away half the forest and did you know that these trees bleed? Well, I would think you do, getting the red sap out and all."  
  
"Nora," said Ren calmly, now watching the jar fill. "if I recall correctly you rushed off a bit too fast to be followed."  
  
"Nu-uh, Coco found me just fine! Although . . . she did take a minute to catch up."  
  
Ren traded the jar for an empty one from Pyrrha.  
  
"Hey Pyrrha!" said Nora, turning to Pyrrha.  
  
Pyrrha nodded silently, carefully capping the jar.  
  
"Uh, Ren? Did you break Pyrrha? She seems quieter than usual. Where's Weiss? Isn't she usually beside Pyrrha any chance she gets?" Nora questioned.  
  
Ren turned to the two of them. "Jaune left about as quickly as you did, presumably to be with Cardin and his team some more."  
  
Nora stuck out her tongue, the thought disgusting her.  
  
"I'm fine, really, and I think Weiss is making sure Ruby doesn't cut down the tree." said Pyrrha, finally contributing. "Nora, let me show you how to seal a jar. The seal these have is imbued with Dust, so with just a little spark of aura we can seal them as well as the long process of heating jars in a lot less time."  
  
          Meanwhile, Weiss had noticed Coco's arrival and stood up, leaving the next jar to seal for Penny. A few steps was all it took to eliminate the distance between herself and Coco.  
  
"Hey," said Weiss, her stance correcting itself. "You missed the demonstration; would you like me to show you how to collect the sap?"  
  
Satisfied that Nora had lost any ambitions to run off, Coco nodded to Weiss. "Sure." she said.  
  
Weiss picked up a kit from a near-by tray along with a jar.  
  
Coco sat down beside her tutor. "Where is Neo?" she asked, looking around.  
  
Weiss rolled her eyes. "She and Blake volunteered to be 'spotters', sitting around and supposedly watching for any incoming grimm."  
  
"Come on!" pleaded Nora, "I'm not trying to trick you, it really is good raw. Here Ruby, watch." Nora grabbed the next jar to seal from Ren and dipped two fingers in. She then proceeded to make a show of licking each side once before putting both in her mouth and drawing them out slowly, ending with a pop as she pulled them free. She licked and smacked her lips to draw home the point. "See?" she asked, holding out the jar to Ruby.  
  
"Must you?" asked Coco, who had turned in time to see Nora's display and winced in response. She shook her head and returned to her work.  
  
Ruby lifted a hand, hesitantly reaching toward the offered jar.  
  
"Don't do eeeet! It's a trap! A trick I say!" Yang called out, reaching in the direction of her sister despite being several metres away. "It's poisoned I promise you!"  
  
          Emerald covered her face, at first to shield her eyes but it quickly changed to covering her mouth in an effort to hide her amusement. Ren and Pyrrha seemed to be doing their best to ignore the others while Penny found herself caught between an open tap and a distracted Ruby with a full jar in her hand. Coco was focused on filling her jar, but Weiss spun around toward her ground-level teammates.  
  
"We are here to collect materials for our professor, not rot our teeth and minds frittering about." said Weiss, standing with her hands on her hips.  
  
Ruby, face and hand red from sap, attempted to defend herself whilst sucking on her lips and fingers. "Weiss, you have to mmm try this. It's so sweet with mmmm out being too thick." She held the jar toward her partner.  
  
"I told you it was poison Ruby! Rotting your mind with all sorts of dirty things, just like Weiss said." worked out Yang between bursts of laughter.  
  
"That's irrelevant!" retorted Weiss, ignoring Yang. "We are here to collect sap for our schoolwork and you are eating what amounts to homework."  
  
Ren cleared his throat and addressed Weiss. "Is there really a point to try to make them stop? We can always just get more."  
  
          Seeing that she lacked any support, Weiss huffed and fell back to a sitting position. Coco seemed to have been waiting, immediately ready with a jar to pass over that needed to be sealed.  
  
Before long production and idle conversation resumed.  
  
"Now Ruby, I respect your skills as an adversary but it was not long ago that Neopolitan and I beat you and Weiss." said Penny.  
  
Ruby shook her head. "Nope, you didn't win, Goodwitch called the match."  
  
" _Professor_ Goodwitch called the match fearing excessive destruction of the premises. It had been made clear that the attack would not only be unavoidable, but also be strong enough to heavily damage the classroom, and presumably win the match."  
  
"See? It was ended before we could defeat you with our special combo. You only _presume_ that you would have won, but you didn't, it was a draw."  
  
"Yeah!" chimed in Yang. "And even if you'd have won it wasn't the full team. If I was in on it I'd have tipped the scales!"  
  
"Nu-uh!" shouted Nora, standing up. "If you were in it then so would I and I'd toss you to the moon before you got in a single punch."  
  
"Weiss!~" called out Ruby. "Team pink is disrespecting your honour!"  
  
"Hey Penny," Weiss began, rising to the bait, "Look where we are now, in a wide open place with school too far away to be hurt. Care to back up your words?"  
  
"Don't!" pleaded Pyrrha.  
  
"Don't encourage them!" said Pyrrha in unison with Coco, both crying out in the hope of sanity and peace.  
  
Ruby, Penny, Yang, and Weiss stood up forthwith; Nora was already on her feet.  
  
"A fight?" asked Emerald, a bit late in joining the conversation. "Can I get in on this too?"  
  
"Yep! You're with us." stated Yang, wrapping her arm around Emerald's before the latter had finished standing up.  
  
"What? No, this is between us and them. Besides, then it'll be imbalanced and they could argue they only lost because of that." countered Ruby.  
  
"Not a problem!" said Nora, bending down to grab a surprised and reluctant Ren's arm. "Ren can play on our team!"  
  
          The debate circled the group a few times, discussing any rules and how much adding JPER would alter the balance as the rest of the group stopped the taps and stood as well. The debate shifted to which side should Pyrrha be on, or if she should be made referee, but the ones against it argued that that would just leave her out. She agreed to remain on the sidelines, although despite Ren's attempts he was not afforded the same opportunity. Weapons were tapped with fingertips, waiting for the first move; Penny's blades hovered behind her, Ruby held a collapsed Crescent Rose to her chest, Yang's gauntlets were already extended, and Emerald's hands on her pistols were mirrored by Ren's in his sleeves.  
  
"Hey guys! You should have seen the ursa I just took on! It -" Jaune stopped in his tracks and words when he saw the scene he had walked quite literally in the middle of.  
  
"Bollocks!" shouted a voice over the others.  
  
          Neopolitan leapt from her branch and landed beside her team, Blake following in short order. Neo landed in position for the formation, teammates scrambling into place, and held her parasol over herself with a smirk on her lips. She brought the weapon in front of her and her three teammates ran forward, their paths erratic but curving. She and Nora were mostly headed straight for team RWBY, with Coco and Penny taking the outer circles.  
  
          Crescent Rose was extended in a wide flurry, nicking a tree and knocking away leaves overhead, forcing Penny's path to widen. Blake swung out, aiming to trip Coco. Weiss had picked her dust and stood ready to enact glyphs, focusing about where Coco and Penny's paths were set to meet. Emerald out-drew Ren and lunged first, forcing him to defense. Yang rushed toward Neo, her punch shattering an illusion and obscuring a swing from Nora.  
  
"CHILDREN!" a voice cut through, sharp and commanding.  
  
Every last muscle froze. The students who had been too close and had to back off, the ones that had come closer to look, everyone that could hear the word abruptly stopped, even breathing and wildlife seemed frozen.  
  
          Ruby's arm muscles shivered as she held her large scythe overhead mid-swing. Nora's face was pained from her own act of absorbing her weapon's momentum. Coco held her minigun, only partially transformed from its bag. Jaune sported a look of terror, his hand mere inches away from Pyrrha's his mouth open mid-apology. Blake's weapon was left to fly past Coco's feet; not pulled back the ribbon fluttered to the leaf-covered ground. Emerald and Ren's arms were entangled; Ren had just maneuvered his gun to point into Emerald's abdomen. Neopolitan was crouched, the hook of her parasol ready to trip Weiss and flip up to smash her shoulder.  
  
At the point when holding a breath would become difficult in any other situation the heads of students slowly, nearly imperceptibly so, turned toward the speaker, Professor Goodwitch.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, that is the end of the second arc, "Communication" (Chapters 8-14). I am putting this fic on hiatus for a while so I can work on some other ideas. I still plan to try to post once a week, but just not this fic for awhile. I have a mixed bag of ideas, one-shots and multi-chapters, so look forward to those. I do have more ideas for this story though, so I do plan to get back to it, but I intend to revise some of the writing in earlier chapters first.


End file.
